LIFE STORIES FOR YOUNG PEOPLE 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 



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LIFE STORIES FOR YOUNG PEOPLE 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 



LIFE STORIES FOR YOUNG PEOPLE 


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. UPTON 


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TpRJNKLIN THE PRINTER 



Life Stories for Young People 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

Translated from the German of 
J. Bruschweiler-Wilhelm 

BY 

GEORGE P. UPTON 

Translator of "Memories,'^ ^^ Immensee,'' etc. 



WITH FOUR ILLUSTRATIONS 




CHICAGO 

A, C. McCLURG ^ CO, 

1911 






Copyright 

A. C. McClurg & Co. 

1911 

Published September, 191 1 






THE • PLIMPTON • PRESS 

[ W D'O ] 
NORWOOD • MASS • U • S • A 



©C1.A2U5753 



Zxansiatox's preface 

THE life of Benjamin Franklin as statesman, 
philosopher, humanitarian, scientist, and 
patriot, the eminent services he performed 
for his country, and the extraordinary wisdom and 
prudence of his well-ordered life, are matters which 
are or should be well known to American youth. It 
may be an added pleasure to read this unusually 
concise and well-prepared abridgment of his life as 
made by a German author for German youth. 

G. P. U. 

Chicago, July, 191 1 



Ivl 



Contents; 



Chapter 

I First Settlers in North America 
II Franklin's Home and School Life 

III The Printer's Apprentice . 

IV Travels 

V Franklin in his Home . 

VI The Popular Author 
VII The Citizen and Statesman 
VIII Honors and Responsibilities 
IX Latter-day Activities and Death 
Appendix 



Page 
II 

i8 
26 
36 
50 
64 

85 
103 
123 
137 



[ vii 



lllu&txationsi 



Page 

Franklin the Printer .... Frontispiece t--" 

Franklin the Tallow-Chandler 22 r^ 

Franklin's Arrival in Philadelphia . . . . 38 ^ 

Franklin his own Porter 56 ' 



[ix] 



Idenjamin ifranfelin 

Chapter I 
The First Settlers in North America 



ON the third of August, 1492, Christopher 
Columbus set sail with his little fleet across 
the Atlantic, on the voyage which was to 
result in the discovery of a new world. But more 
than a century passed after the discovery of America 
before the first Europeans effected any permanent 
settlement upon the northern half of the western 
hemisphere. Although as early as Queen Eliza- 
beth's reign, two Englishmen, Gilbert and Walter 
Raleigh, had landed on Pvoanoke Island with the 
object of founding a colony, their efforts had proved 
unsuccessful. They named the territory on the 
eastern coast of the mainland, lying south of 40° 
of latitude, Virginia, in honor of Elizabeth, the Vir- 
gin Queen; but it was not until April, 1607, after 
a voyage of five months, that the first group of 
colonists, sent out by a London trading company, 
landed in the western world. They sailed across 
Chesapeake Bay to the James River, where they 

[II] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

founded Jamestown, the nucleus of the first colony 
which gradually grew up around it. 

This colony was soon in great straits, both by 
reason of continual quarrels with the Indians and 
of internal dissentions, but principally because agri- 
culture had been entirely neglected and the search 
for precious metals and other treasures, which had 
become the sole object of the colonists, could not 
support them nor contribute to the prosperity of 
the community. Their wretchedness increased with 
each advent of newcomers, until the trading com- 
pany in London, considering themselves the lawful 
owners of the territory between 34° and 40° of lati- 
tude north, by reason of a patent granted them by 
King James I, sent a governor to Jamestown and 
in response to earnest appeals, empowered him to 
allot a piece of ground to each planter. From this 
time the condition of the colony began to improve, 
for each settler now saw the possibility of attaining 
ease and prosperity through the exercise of diligence 
and frugality. The first plan of the company, by 
which the colonists were to be supported from the 
public funds, delivering up the fruit of their labors 
to the storehouses of the community, thus received 
its timely death-blow, for men were as unfitted then, 
as now, for a socialistic state. Pleasant social rela- 
tions and family life, with its accompanying settled 
habits, first became general in the colony with the 
arrival of a shipload of poor but respectable English 
girls, destined to become the mothers of a new people. 

[12] 



THE FIRST SETTLERS 

They landed in Jamestown in 1629, soon after the 
arrival of Sir Yardeley, the second governor, to 
whom the colony was indebted for its first consti- 
tution. 

Sir Yardeley selected a representative planter from 
each of the neighboring communities and assembled 
all at Jamestown to constitute the future Council 
of State and to enact laws which should ensure the 
prosperity of the people. Great attention was paid 
to the cultivation of the soil and particularly to the 
raising of tobacco, in consequence of which smoking 
was introduced into England, to King James' great 
displeasure. As the tobacco plantations could only 
be extended at the expense of the Indian hunting 
grounds, the aborigines determined to rid themselves 
of the white invaders at one blow. On the twenty- 
second of May, 1622, they massacred 1300 settlers, 
regardless of age or sex, without pausing to realize 
in their blind rage that this bloody deed was sure to 
inaugurate a merciless war of extermination against 
themselves. This terrible massacre in the pros- 
perous young colony caused strained relations be- 
tween the crown and the people for a long period. 
King James put the blame upon the trading com- 
pany, which had sent nearly 9000 settlers to Vir- 
ginia, and had expended about ^750,000 on the 
colony. With the assistance of amenable judges he 
declared all the patents and privileges of the com- 
pany to be null and void. 

James' successor on the English throne, Charles I, 

[13] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

treated the colony as a royal province, but without 
curtailing the property rights of the planters in any 
way. His governor, however, the third in Virginia, 
ruled with an arbitrary sway, which the colonists 
found all the more irksome because, in the northern 
part of their territory, across the Potomac, ' the 
colony of Maryland had sprung up under the patron- 
age of the King and was prospering exceedingly under 
the wise and benign guidance of Lord Baltimore. 
There the persecuted Catholics of Ireland found 
asylum, each immigrant receiving a plot of fifty 
acres of ground, irrespective of his religious belief 
or church affiliations. It was not until 1641 that 
the same rights which Maryland enjoyed were con- 
ferred upon Virginia by a liberal-minded governor, 
and from that time it developed so rapidly that its 
population soon numbered 20,000. 

In 1663 King Charles II granted the land along 
the coast between 31° and 36° of latitude north, to 
eight English gentlemen for the founding of a new 
colony, and the Virginians were obliged meekly to 
submit to this curtailment of their stipulated terri- 
torial rights. Immigrants flocked to the new settle- 
ment from all sides — especially Catholics and 
Protestants. This was the locality which Admiral 
Coligny had named Carolina in honor of Charles IX 
of France, having selected it years previously as a 
place of refuge for the persecuted Huguenots, little 
dreaming that the treacherous Spaniards were to 
fall upon and murder them. 

[14] 



THE FIRST SETTLERS 

On the site of the present city of New York, in 
the year 1623, there were a few huts with thatched 
roofs and wooden fireplaces, bearing the proud 
designation of New Amsterdam. They constituted 
the settlement of New Netherland, founded by the 
English explorer, Henry Hudson, in behalf of the 
Dutch. 

At the same time that King James I had granted 
Virginia to the London trading company, he also 
granted to another company of merchants which 
had been organized in Plymouth, the strip of coast 
between 40° and 46° of latitude north, to be called 
New England. But as this company did not pos- 
sess the necessary capital to finance settlements of 
its own, a little band of Pilgrims numbering 102 
souls, took advantage of this circumstance and set- 
ting sail for the present coast of Massachusetts in 
the year 1620, founded the seaport town of New 
Plymouth.^ 

^ These were the Pilgrims who by religious persecutions during the 
reign of James I had been driven into Holland and who now, suffering 
indescribable hardships and with no further authority from the English 
government than the promise not to interfere with them, chartered the 
Mayflower, which brought the first shipload of their community to the 
shores of New England. Their pastor, Mr. Robinson, addressed the de- 
parting company in eloquent words, which glowed with the fire of that 
splendid freedom of the children of God which the Gospel promises and 
which Protestantism had kindled anew. He adjured them "before God 
and His holy angels" not to follow him or any one, be he even a Luther 
or a Calvin, any farther than they had seen that person follow the Lord 
Jesus Christ ; to hold themselves in readiness to accept every truth 
which should be revealed to them in "the written word of God"; and 
in this spirit, on board the Mayflower and within sight of the new country, 

[15] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 



The fanatical treatment which the Puritans met 
with at this time at the hands of King James I, who 
persecuted and oppressed their congregations, robbed 
him of subjects who had been stanch supporters of 
his august predecessor, Queen Elizabeth, and caused 
the emigration of great bands of the believers to 
North America to found new homes in one place or 
another. To his own disadvantage, as well as to 
that of the whole country, he carried his brutal 
measures so far that thousands of these most valu- 
able citizens turned their backs on their old home 
to enjoy religious freedom in the New World. 
Later, during the reign of his successor, Charles I, m 
1626, a whole community emigrated to Massachu- 
setts and founded the town of Salem; in 1630 seven- 
teen ships arrived with 1500 souls on board, and six 
years later, a company of 3000 arrived together, 
which settled on the Connecticut. On account of 
its excellent harbor Boston soon became the prin- 
cipal city of the rapidly growing colony, and in 1700 
already numbered more than 10,000 inhabitants. 
Among the various peoples who have settled in 
North America, it is certain that the Puritan immi- 
grants have proved to be a leavening power, through 
their stanch faith in the Bible. The efficacy of 

these men organized their new State. "In th^name of God Amen: we, 
who for the glory of God, the propagation of the Christian faith and the 
honor of our king and country have undertaken this journey to found 
the first colony In the northern part of Virginia, bind ^^^J^^l^^f^Pf^^S^^^. 
in the presence of God, to form a body politic ..." (Jager, History of 
the World," III, 615). 

fi61 



THE FIRST SETTLERS 

this faith none but the blind can fail to recognize, 
especially in these days, when we find Christianity 
numbering its adherents among all classes of society; 
in Church and State, in the halls of Congress in 
Washington and amongst the people, and main- 
taining a status in our country which the savants 
and thinkers, inventors and military men of the Old 
World no longer concede to it: that of a mighty 
world-conquering power. 



[17 



Chapter II 
Franklin s Home and School Life 

IT is more than a hundred years since the death 
of the world-renowned American, Benjamin 
Franklin, and in spite of this, his name has 
remained as fresh in our memories as though he 
were one of our best known contemporaries. On 
both sides of the world every school-boy is familiar 
with his name. Although born and brought up in 
poor and modest circumstances, he raised himself 
above millions of his contemporaries and acquired 
undying fame in various departments of knowledge. 
This fame includes another, that of his unceasing 
labors for the good of his fellow-beings, his high 
moral ideals making him one of the best of men. 
Thus Franklin deserves our undivided respect and 
admiration, even though we may discover faults in 
his character. 

His youth goes back to the time of the reign of 
Queen Anne in England, when the great country 
which now bears the name of the United States of 
North America consisted of only eleven colonies under 
the sovereignty of England, with scarcely 400,000 
souls. At that time the eastern coast was ravaged 

[18] 



HOME AND SCHOOL LIFE 

by pirates, the interior was overrun with wolves and 
panthers, and a continual warfare existed between 
the Indians and the settlers and also between the 
French and English colonists over their territorial 
rights. 

/ Franklin was born in Boston, in the modest home 
of the soapmaker, Josiah Franklin. He had sixteen 
brothers and sisters, only one of them, his favorite 
sister, Jenny, being younger than himself. On the 
January morning in 1706, when Josiah Franklin laid 
little Benjamin in his cradle and his brothers and 
sisters crowded round with curious looks to welcome 
the newcomer, the good father's heart was filled 
with joy and gratitude to God for this precious gift, 
which, though it brought him new responsibilities, 
with the necessity for harder work and greater 
frugality, nevertheless increased his faith in God, — 
for he was a man of childlike piety, and was con- 
fident that the Heavenly Father, who had thus far 
supported him wondrously in his care for fifteen 
children, would not now desert him. Neither the 
parents nor any of the family, however, dreamed 
that this tiny, wailing infant was to bring celebrity 
and distinction to the name of Franklin both in the 
New World and the Old! 

The honest soapmaker had come from the little 
English hamlet of Ecton in Northamptonshire, 
where his forefathers for three hundred years had 
subsisted on the income from a small freehold, 
.together with the earnings of the eldest son, who 

[19] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

had always followed the trade of a blacksmith. 
The Franklins had early espoused the reformed faith 
and remained true to it, even during the reign of 
Queen Mary, although in her zeal for the papacy 
she had left no means untried for the extermination 
of the heretics. The family owned an English 
Bible, and for fear of losing it, they took the pre- 
caution of fastening it, with cords across the open 
pages, under the seat of a folding stool. When the 
grandfather read from it, he would turn the stool 
up on his knees while one of the children kept watch 
at the door. If the little sentinel saw the apparitor, 
an officer of the spiritual court, approaching, he 
would give the signal and the stool would be turned 
down again upon its feet. 

<. Towards the end of the reign of Charles II, Josiah 
Franklin attended meetings in Ecton, which a de- 
posed preacher of the reformed faith was holding in 
Northamptonshire in spite of a royal decree. Weary 
of the constant breaking up of these meetings and 
consequent penalties imposed, a number of the 
principal men determined to emigrate and join their 
fellow-believers in New England. Among those 
who sailed across the sea was Josiah Franklin with 
his wife and three children. He was a dyer by 
trade, but finding that his calling was not in demand 
in Boston, where he had settled, he became a soap- 
maker and tallow-chandler, a business which he also 
understood. 

Franklin says in his autobiography: 

[20] 



HOME AND SCHOOL LIFE 

"I think you may like to know something of his 
person and character. He had an excellent con- 
stitution of body, was of middle stature, but well 
set and very strong; he was ingenious, could draw 
prettily, was skilled a little in music, and had a 
clear, pleasing voice, so that when he played psalm 
tunes on his violin and sung withal, as he sometimes 
did of an evening after the business of the day was 
over, it was extremely agreeable to hear. He had a 
mechanical genius, too, and on occasion, was very 
handy in the use of other tradesmen's tools; but his 
great excellence lay in a sound understanding and 
solid judgment in prudential matters, both in private 
and public aflFairs. In the latter, indeed, he was 
never employed, the numerous family he had to 
educate and the straitness of his circumstances keep- 
ing him close to his trade; but I remember well his 
being frequently visited by leading people, who con- 
sulted him for his opinion in affairs of the town or 
of the church he belonged to and showed a good deal 
of respect for his judgment and advice; he was also 
much consulted by private persons about their 
affairs when any difficulty occurred, and frequently 
chosen an arbitrator between contending parties." 

When a laborer raises a family of seventeen chil- 
dren by the work of his own hands he has certainly 
accomplished a splendid task. How fortunate the 
parents who can prepare such a family for useful 
lives and guide them toward the higher ideals! 
The father cherished the hope of seeing at least one 

[21] . 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

of his ten sons in the ministry, for he was himself 
much interested in religious affairs and studied the 
Word of God diligently. As little Benjamin, the 
youngest of the ten brothers, showed early signs of 
intellectual promise, he was sent to the grammar 
school at the age of eight years, to prepare for a 
thorough education. According to the custom of 
the times, he had learned to read at his mother's 
knee so early that, at his entrance into school, he 
could scarcely remember when he had begun. He 
now determined that he must economize his time, 
and he studied so hard that in six months, or in 
half the usual time, the teacher was obliged to pro- 
mote him to the second class. He continued to 
study with such diligence and success that in another 
six months he was prepared to enter the third class. 

But alas! the tide had turned and his father had 
come to realize that with the burden of so large a 
family he would not be able to afford the higher 
education for Benjamin. He took him away from 
the grammar school and put him into a school for 
writing and arithmetic, where he acquired fine pen- 
manship, but was always at loggerheads with figures. 
With this schooling Benjamin's education was com- 
pleted, and the moment had come for him to enter 
the high school of practical life, that is to say, his 
father's workshop, where he was to boil soap and 
mould candles. The father's business proved very 
distasteful to the boy; he hated filling the moulds 
of the greasy tallow candles, as well as the boiling of 

[22] 




F 



RANKLIN THE TALLOW-CHANDLER 



HOME AND SCHOOL LIFE 

the soap, and the workshop soon became a prison 
to him, and freedom appeared so enticing that he 
began to seek escape from it as often as possible. 
His mind roamed afar and the nearness of the sea 
exerted a continual fascination over him. Not a 
hundred yards from the doorstep lay the ocean 
with its busy life, the ebb and flow of the tide, 
and its ships and sailors! What joy it must be to 
plough its waters in a struggle with the rolling 
waves! 

"When in a boat or canoe with other boys," he 
says in his autobiography, " I was commonly allowed 
to govern, especially in any case of difliculty; and 
upon other occasions I was generally a leader among 
the boys and sometimes led them into scrapes, of 
which I will mention one instance, as it shows an 
early projecting spirit, tho' not then justly con- 
ducted. There was a salt marsh that bounded part 
of the mill-pond, on the edge of which, at high water, 
we used to stand to fish for minnows. By much 
trampling we had made it a mere quagmire. My 
proposal was to build a wharf there fit for us to 
stand upon, and I showed my comrades a large heap 
of stones, which were intended for a new house near 
the marsh and which would very well suit our 
purpose. Accordingly, in the evening, when the 
workmen were gone, I assembled a number of my 
play-fellows, and working with them diligently like 
so many emmets, sometimes two or three to a stone, 
we brought them all away and built our little wharf. 

[23 1 • 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

The next morning the workmen were surprised at 
missing the stones, which were found in our wharf. 
Inquiry was made after the removers; we were dis- 
covered and complained of; several of us were cor- 
rected by our fathers; and though I pleaded the 
usefulness of the work, mine convinced me that 
nothing was useful which was not honest." 

Benjamin's love for the sea caused his father no 
less anxiety than his distaste for the business. While 
trying in every way to combat the former, he was 
wise enough not to force the boy into a calling 
which was every day becoming more and more 
irksome. He very much feared that Benjamin 
might run away some day to become a sailor, like 
his elder brother Josiah. After carefully consider- 
ing what was to be done, he hit upon the wise plan 
of making his twelve-year-old son acquainted with 
the different trades in the town, in order to discover, 
if possible, which one he had most inclination for. 
Unfortunately the experiment was not successful, for 
Benjamin did not seem to take to any of them. He 
was finally apprenticed to a cutler, a cousin who 
had learned the trade in London and was now prac- 
tising it in Boston, but Benjamin was soon taken 
away because the fees proved too expensive. Frank- 
lin's parents were in despair over the problem of 
choosing a calling for the boy. 

At last his father, bethinking himself of the fact 
that Benjamin was passionately fond of reading, 

[24] 



HOME AND SCHOOL LIFE 

decided to make a printer of him. But he had to 
exert his utmost powers of persuasion before he 
could induce him finally to renounce the sea and 
sign the apprenticeship papers which he laid before 
him. 



Us 



Chapter III 
The Printer s Apprentice 



THE contract which Benjamin was obliged to 
sign called for eight years' service without 
compensation. Did a boy ever enter upon 
an apprenticeship under more unfavorable con- 
ditions than the twelve-year-old Benjamin with his 
elder brother, the Boston printer, James Franklin 1 
How could the otherwise so considerate and wise 
father have accepted these conditions! We can 
only understand and excuse him when we consider 
that Benjamin's passionate love of a sailor's life had 
made the father long impatiently for the day when 
a settled occupation should divert the boy's thoughts 
into other channels. But we can find no excuse for 
the brother, who, taking advantage of his father's 
fears, used them to his own utmost advantage. 

Benjamin conscientiously fulfilled his duties in his 
brother's business, hard as it was for him to leave an 
interesting book unopened all day long. Once at 
work, he grew to like his future profession so well 
and made such progress in type-setting in a com- 
paratively short time, that, even during his first 
year, he rendered his brother valuable service, and 
in the course of the second year took the place of a 

[26] 



THE PRINTER'S APPRENTICE 

skilled workman. As he had no leisure during the 
day, he looked forward to the evenings, which he 
always passed within the four walls of his bedroom, 
often reading until his tallow candles burned them- 
selves outf Formerly he had purchased books with 
every piece of money he received and now, through 
acquaintance with bookshop apprentices, he was 
able occasionally to borrow a book, which he took 
care to return very promptly and in good condition, 
often taking them back the very next morning. A 
merchant in the city, who frequently visited the 
printing house, also lent him whatever he wished 
from his own library, so that from this time reading 
matter no longer failed him. 

About this time he began to take inexpressible 
delight in poetry and to try his skill in rhyming. 
Some examples must have come to his brother's 
notice, for he encouraged Benjamin to put into 
verse two episodes in the life and deeds of the 
pirates of those days which had caused great excite- 
ment throughout the country, hoping to get some 
profit from it. This encouragement was oil on 
Benjamin's fire and he immediately began to com- 
pose two ballads; one, on the sad fate of Teach, the 
dread pirate, called "Black Beard"; the other about 
the drowning of Captain Worthilake and his two 
daughters, with the title, "The Lighthouse Tragedy." 

Teach was one of the crudest and most terrible 
among the many pirates who kept the town of New 
Providence in a state of terror at the beginning of 

[27] • 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

the eighteenth century. He was driven into Pam- 
lico Sound by the sudden appearance of a warship, 
and there, protected by the laws but execrated by 
the people, he settled down to squander his ill-gotten 
gains in riotous living. When all was gone he re- 
sumed his adventurous career once more, gathered a 
crew about him, fitted out a ship which he called a 
cruiser, and became a pirate. A few weeks after- 
ward he appeared in Pamlico Sound on board a fine 
French ship with a rich cargo, declaring that he had 
bought the craft. The crew knew well enough what 
that meant and notified the governor, and a war 
vessel soon appeared off Pamlico. On the Novem- 
ber evening when Teach discovered the enemy's 
ship he tried to steal away in the darkness, but next 
morning the cruiser chased him in and out of every 
inlet and bay along the coast until it succeeded in 
grappling the pirate's ship. Covered with wounds 
and surrounded by the dead. Teach turned to fire 
his last pistol at his pursuers and died upon the deck 
of the stolen ship. 

When a pirate fell into the hands of the law a ter- 
rible sentence awaited him. The case was conducted 
with the greatest haste and his condemnation was 
a foregone conclusion. After a long sermon, pre- 
ceded by an equally long prayer, the judge pronounced 
the sentence. On Sunday or Thursday he was loaded 
with chains and taken away to the place of execu- 
tion, a solemn procession of the inhabitants following 
him and his coffin, as though it were a holiday. 

[28] 



THE PRINTER'S APPRENTICE 

Arrived at the spot, the sentence and name of the 
culprit were announced, and then amidst prayers he 
was executed. 

Such gruesome tales were enjoyed by the people 
and widely read. Benjamin was but one among 
hundreds who celebrated them in verse. His 
brother James printed the two ballads in pamphlet 
form and sent the poet into the city to peddle them, 
where they became very popular and fulfilled their 
mission, which was to make money. Benjamin's 
name did not appear on the pamphlets, but who can 
blame him if he enjoyed the fame of a new poet.f* 
If it had not been for his father's warning voice, 
this small success might have become a rock of 
danger for him. 

In the autobiography he says: "My vanity was 
flattered; but my father discouraged me by ridicul- 
ing my performances, and telling me verse makers 
were generally beggars. So I escaped being a poet, 
most probably a very bad one." 

It was fortunate for the boy that he usually took 
his father's advice to heart and so did not, as many 
another In the same circumstances might have done, 
foolishly overvaluing his verses, choose a calling 
which would have prevented him from developing 
his real powers. In another case likewise his father's 
opinion was valuable to him. Benjamin was very 
intimate with a young man of his own age named 
Collins, who was, like himself, passionately fond of 
reading. One evening they had a discussion on the 

[29] ■ 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

propriety of the higher education for women and 
their capacity for study. They got into a heated 
argument over their differences of opinion, and the 
continuation of the discussion was carried on in 
writing. Franklin's father happening to discover 
the letters took the opportunity of criticising Ben- 
jamin's style, noting, amongst other things, that 
while he was superior to his opponent Collins in 
spelling and syntax, in elegance of diction and clear- 
ness of expression he was far behind him. Through 
the comparisons which his father instituted, Ben- 
jamin became convinced of the justice of the criti- 
cism and courageously resolved to use all the means 
in his power from this time forth to improve his 
literary style. More industriously than ever he 
now applied himself to his studies before and after 
working hours and even on Sunday. He would 
read over and over such pieces from the English 
periodical, the "Spectator," as seemed to him fine 
examples of literary style, rewriting them after- 
ward from memory, and, several weeks later, com- 
paring his work with the original. Or, to enrich his 
vocabulary, he would turn a tale into verse in order, 
months afterward when it had faded from his mind, 
to rewrite it in prose. 

In order to train his mind in consecutive thinking 
he would sometimes mix up all his notes, trying 
after some time to reduce them to order again 
before he began to elaborate them. He continued 
these exercises until he began to have grounds for 

[30] 



THE PRINTER'S APPRENTICE 

hope that he might in time become a master of 
style and expression. 

His ignorance of mathematics having caused him 
some embarrassment at one time, he bought an 
arithmetic and carefully studied it through, and read 
besides a work on navigation in order to learn the 
first principles of geometry which it contained. He 
also studied Xenophon's "Memorabilia of Socrates," 
as well as some essays on oratory and a treatise on 
logic to fill out as v/ell as possible the gaps which 
his two years' schooling had left. This love of work 
remained with him even in his old age. His youthful 
zeal is an example to. every youth of the strenuous 
effort which alone can produce the able man. 

Quite unexpectedly an opportunity offered of 
making use of the skill which he had acquired 
through his untiring studies. In 172 1 his brother 
James began to publish the New England Courant, 
the second newspaper issued in America, though 
many of his colleagues at first advised against the 
undertaking, as they thought that one paper was 
sufficient for the country. They were wont to 
congregate in his shop after working hours to dis- 
cuss the articles which had appeared, to consider 
the refusal or acceptance of those which had been 
sent in for approval, and all matters connected with 
the management of the paper. Benjamin, who stood 
unnoticed in a corner, was very desirous of contribut- 
ing some articles, but he knew well enough that his 
brother would never accept a syllable from a fifteen- 

[31] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

year-old boy. So he resorted to a trick. At night 
he wrote a piece in disguised handwriting and sHpped 
it under the door of the printing-office, where it was 
found by James in the morning. That evening the 
work was read to friends, who were astonished 
at its beauty and indulged in all manner of specula- 
tion as to who the author might be, mentioning the 
names of well-known men in the neighborhood and 
expressing their satisfaction over the new contribu- 
tor. This was sufficient to spur the young author, 
who kept as still as a mouse, to renewed contribu- 
tions and to entertain his brother's friends as well 
as the daily increasing readers of the Courant, for at 
least six weeks, or until he had written himself out 
for the time being, in fourteen long articles. 

It was his opinion that readers would be glad to 
know something of the personalities of those who 
were to instruct and entertain them; therefore he 
introduced himself to the subscribers to the Courant 
as a pastor's widow living in the country, who was 
not disinclined to make some amiable, well-to-do 
man of good habits and pleasing exterior, happy, and 
unfolding a charming picture of their life and labors 
together, etc., signing himself, at the close of each 
article, "Mrs. Silentia Dogood," so that these lit- 
erary efforts were generally known as the "Dogood 
Papers" or "Mrs. Dogood's Letters." Benjamin 
kept his secret until the last one had appeared. 
When he at length revealed himself as the author, 
the bold youth received not a single word of appro- 

[32] 



THE PRINTER'S APPRENTICE 

bation nor a friendly smile from his brother James, 
who preserved a stony silence. But henceforth, the 
more friendly apprentices treated Benjamin with a 
new respect. 

The relationship between master and apprentice 
had never been a pleasant one and as time went on 
it became more and more strained. The master 
was always insisting on his rights, while the boy was 
constantly claiming the privileges of a brother, 
wishing to be treated in a brotherly fashion even 
if not receiving the just rewards of his usefulness, 
talents, and industry. But James Franklin appears 
to have been a choleric, dictatorial, and irritable 
man, who was inclined on every occasion to discipline 
his talented but obstreperous apprentice with blows, 
instead of striving to win him with kindness. In his 
self-confidence Benjamin may perhaps have often 
forgotten himself, as sometimes happens with youths 
of his age, but the following incident should have 
opened his brother's eyes to his real merit. 

A political article in the Courant having offended 
the law-making body of Massachusetts, they arrested 
the responsible editor of the paper and condemned 
him to a month's imprisonment. While James was 
in prison, Benjamin attended to the editing and 
printing of the paper, and being outraged at the 
severity of the authorities against his brother, he 
took this opportunity, which seemed to him favor- 
able, to print a relentless criticism of the verdict. 
When James had served out his time, he was for- 

[33] . 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

bidden by the council to continue the publication 
of the New England Courant, and after a consultation 
with his friends, he decided to allow the paper to 
appear under Benjamin's name. But in order to 
secure himself on all sides against the magistrates 
as well as his brother, it was arranged that Benjamin 
was to receive the old articles of apprenticeship, 
with a quittance of all his obligations written upon 
the back of them; but in a new and secret document 
he was to pledge himself anew, over his signature, 
to serve out the whole time of his apprenticeship as 
before. After the newspaper had appeared for 
several months under Benjamin's name, the old 
quarrels broke out again between the brothers, and 
this time their father's efforts to keep the peace be- 
tween them proved fruitless. As James suspected 
that his apprentice might seek employment in 
another shop in the town, he appealed to the other 
printers in Boston not to take him in, — an action 
which could but cause bitterness and shows his 
character in its true light. Thus he took the precise 
course which, both as a brother and a good business 
man, he should not have done. Instead of unselfishly 
appreciating the industry, circumspection, and faith- 
fulness of the boy, instead of giving him his freedom 
unconditionally and offering him a share in the print- 
ing business, he drove him away by his severity, bad 
temper, and brutality. 

Benjamin quietly made his preparations for chang- 
ing his unenviable situation at one stroke. Getting 

[34] 



THE PRINTER'S APPRENTICE 

a little money by the sale of his books and with the 
help of his friend Collins, who arranged for his 
passage with the captain of a ship, he secretly left 
Boston. 



3S] 



Chapt 



er IV 

Travels 



WITH favorable winds Benjamin set sail from 
Boston in a schooner for New York. Thus 
the passionate desire of his boyhood was at 
last fulfilled — he was sailing far, far away from his 
native city upon the broad ocean. But it is quite 
a different thing to go out into the world with your 
parents' blessing than to steal away from home in 
the darkness, like a culprit. He missed his mother's 
last loving look and his father's "God bless you, my 
son"; and he was troubled by the anguish which he 
knew he had caused those dear ones at home by 
his sudden disappearance. His conscience began to 
awaken. 

Arriving in New York, which was a rapidly develop- 
ing seaport, he went at once to the printing estab- 
lishment of William Bradford, who, however, was 
unable to employ him on account of lack of business, 
but directed him to his son, who was a printer in 
Philadelphia and whose chief workman had recently 
died. Although Philadelphia was another hundred 
miles distant and Benjamin's funds were scanty, 
he immediately set out in a boat for Perth Amboy, 

[36] 



TRAVELS 



which lies on the lower part of New York Bay. In 
crossing the bay they were overtaken by a storm 
which prevented the boat from entering Kill Inlet, 
as had been intended, and they were driven toward 
Long Island. The high winds and rough surf kept 
them from making a landing and they were obliged 
to lay to and wait for better weather. During this 
stormy trip a drunken Hollander who was a fellow- 
passenger, fell into the water and was pulled out by 
Benjamin, only to fall asleep in his wet clothes 
between decks. Benjamin and the skipper also 
took refuge there in the hope of being able to get 
some sleep. But the waves broke over the ship so 
that they were soon as wet as the snoring Hollander. 
Hungry and thirsty, they had been tossing on the 
angry waters for thirty hours before the storm sub- 
sided; the following day they reached Perth Amboy 
just before dusk. Benjamin went to bed with a 
high fever. He drank water plentifully in order to 
perspire, and the next morning crossed the river in 
a canoe, determined to walk the fifty miles to Bur- 
lington, where he hoped to find good sailing vessels. 
The rain fell in torrents and at noon he entered an 
inn, regretting with all his heart that he had ever 
left Boston. He was not able to continue his jour- 
ney until the next morning, and was then obliged 
to stop over at an inn eight or ten miles before 
reaching Burlington, where he was made welcome. 
Twenty-four hours afterward, when He entered Bur- 
lington, he learned to his sorrow that the regular 

[37] . 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

boats for Philadelphia had already gone and that 
the next one would not leave for three days. 

It was Saturday. An old woman, to whom he 
confided his ill luck, offered him food and lodging, 
and even wished to persuade him to open a printing- 
shop in Burlington, but desisted when she learned 
how large a capital was necessary for such an under- 
taking. Before going to bed, Benjamin took a walk 
along the river bank, discovered a boat which was 
going to Philadelphia and was taken on board. 
They were obhged to use the oars for want of wind, 
and did not arrive in Philadelphia until Sunday 
morning. The autobiography says: 

"On my first entry into that city I was in working 
dress, my best clothes being to come round by sea. 
I was dirty from my journey; my pockets were 
stuffed out with shirts and stockings, and I knew 
no soul, nor where to look for lodging. I was fa- 
tigued with travelling, rowing, and want of rest, I 
was very hungry, and my whole stock of cash con- 
sisted of a Dutch dollar, and about a shilling in 
copper. The latter I gave the people of the boat 
for my passage, who at first refused it, on account 
of my rowing; but I insisted on their taking it, a 
man being sometimes more generous when he has 
but a little money, than when he has plenty, per- 
haps thro' fear of being thought to have but little. 

"Then I walked up the street, gazing about till 
near the market-house I met a boy with bread. I 
had made many a meal on bread, and inquiring 

[38I 




T^RANKLIN'S ARRIVAL IN PHILADELPHIA 



TRAVELS 



where he got it, I went immediately to the baker's 
he directed me to, in Second Street, and asked for 
biscuit, intending such as we had in Boston, but it 
seems they were not made in Philadelphia. Then 
I asked for a three-penny loaf and was told they 
had none such. So not considering or knowing the 
difference of money and the greater cheapness, nor 
the names of his bread, I bade him give me three- 
penny worth of any sort. He gave me, accordingly, 
three great puffy rolls. I was surprised at the 
quantity, but took it, and, having no room in my 
pockets, walked off with a roll under each arm and 
eating the other. Thus I went up Market Street 
as far as Fourth Street, passing by the door of Mr. 
Read, my future wife's father; when she, standing at 
the door, saw me and thought I made, as I cer- 
tainly did, a most awkward, ridiculous appearance. 
Then I turned and went down Chestnut Street and 
part of Walnut Street, eating my roll all the way, 
and coming round, found myself again at Market 
Street wharf, near the boat I came in, to which I 
went for a draught of the river water; and being 
filled with one of my rolls, gave the other two to a 
woman and her child that came down the. river in 
the boat with us, and were waiting to go farther. 

"Thus refreshed, I walked again up the street, 
which by this time had many clean-dressed people 
in it, who were all walking the same way. I joined 
them and was thereby led into the great meeting- 
house of the Quakers near the Market. I sat down 

[39] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

among them, and after looking round a while and 
hearing nothing said, being very drowsy through 
labor and want of rest the preceding night, I fell 
fast asleep and continued so till the meeting broke 
up, when one was kind enough to rouse me. This 
therefore was the first house I was in, or slept in, in 
Philadelphia. . . . Entering an inn in Water Street 
I ordered a dinner, and, while I was eating it, several 
sly questions were asked me, as it seemed to be 
suspected from my youth and appearance, that I 
might be some runaway. 

"After dinner my sleepiness returned, and being 
shown to a bed I lay down without undressing and 
slept till six in the evening, was called to supper, 
went to bed again very early, and slept soundly till 
next morning. Then I made myself as tidy as I 
could and went to Andrew Bradford, the printer's. 
I found in the shop, the old man, his father, whom 
I had seen at New York, and who, travelling on 
horseback, had got to Philadelphia before me. He 
introduced me to his son, who received me civilly, 
gave me a breakfast, but told me he did not at 
present want a hand, being lately supplied with 
one; but there was another printer in town, one 
Keimer, who might perhaps employ me; if not, I 
should be welcome to lodge at his house and he 
would give me a little work to do now and then till 
fuller business should offer." 

At Keimer's also, where the elder Bradford took 
him, the prospects were not encouraging. He was 

[40] 



TRAVELS 



told that just at present there was nothing for him 
but that probably there would be work for him 
before long. In the meanwhile he lodged with 
young Bradford, where he endeavored to make him- 
self useful until Keimer should be able to offer him 
regular employment. As the master did not have 
a home of his own, he secured quarters for his ap- 
prentice in the house of Mr. Read, where he himself 
lodged. 

When our swallow had found his little nest, his 
existence became pleasanter, combining hard work 
with adequate pay; and this quiet existence would 
probably have continued much longer than seven 
months had it not been for the intervention of the 
governor of Pennsylvania, Sir William Keith, from 
Newcastle. This high official happening to come 
across a letter which Franklin had written to his 
brother-in-law, appeared one day at Keimer's and 
requested speech with his assistant, Franklin. The 
latter was greatly astonished when this richly dressed 
gentleman invited him to enter a tavern, where he 
informed him that he needed an able, reliable printer 
in Philadelphia to whom he could confidently entrust 
all the government printing business, and ended by 
urging him to establish a printing shop upon the 
spot already in the possession of the two ignorant 
and incapable printers — Bradford and Keimer. 
It was of no use for Benjamin to argue that it was 
very doubtful whether his father would ever con- 
sent to so hazardous an undertaking. Sir William 

[41] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

Keith but urged him the more not to give up the 
plan; he promised to write to his father and explain 
to him all the advantages of the project and to place 
it in such a favorable light that he could not fail 
to approve. In the meanwhile no one must know 
anything about it, and Benjamin's journey to Bos- 
ton to talk over the affair must appear to be simply 
a visit to his parents. 

When the letter was written and the prodigal son 
made his appearance with it in Boston, his father 
and mother, who had heard nothing of him in seven 
long months, were greatly surprised and welcomed 
him with open arms. But his brother James, whom 
he visited in the shop and greeted pleasantly, was 
cold and forbidding and angrily repelled every effort 
at a reconciliation, which his mother tried to effect. 
Benjamin's father called the governor's proposition 
nonsensical and declared himself roundly opposed to 
it. However, he thanked Sir William Keith in a 
polite letter for the interest he had shown in his 
son, remarking that Benjamin would not be of age 
for three years, and besides being much too young, 
was also too inexperienced for the management of 
so important a business. On Benjamin's departure 
he exhorted him earnestly to be courteous to every 
one, to seek to win the respect of all, to avoid scoff- 
ing and mockery, to practise economy, steadiness, 
perseverance, and quiet deliberation in all things, so 
that he might be able when a few years older, with 
his own means, or, if necessary, with his father's help, 

[42] 



TRAVELS 



to found a business of his own on a firm basis. 
Benjamin returned to Philadelphia, this time with 
his parents' blessing. 

His friend Collins, who had been employed in the 
post-office in Boston, was charmed by Franklin's 
description of the country and people in Pennsyl- 
vania and left Boston just before he did, with the 
intention of settling in Philadelphia also. The 
friends met in New York and there Benjamin was 
horrified to learn that poor John had lately taken 
to drinking and had lost all his money at play in a 
New York tavern. Benjamin was obliged to pay 
his travelling expenses to Philadelphia and to keep 
him, until he left, a few months later, for Barbadoes. 
Continuing to work at Keimer's printing house as 
formerly, Benjamin now often visited the governor, 
unfortunately not to his advantage. Far from being 
diverted from his original plan by the letter from 
Franklin's father. Sir William made the youth fur- 
nish an inventory of all that was necessary for a 
small printing shop, promising to pay his travelling 
expenses and to give him letters of recommendation 
to friends in London, and, besides this, a letter of 
credit for one hundred pounds to buy printing 
presses and type; in fact, all that was necessary to 
set him up in the business. Benjamin boarded a 
ship sailing from Newcastle to London, expecting 
to find on board all that the governor had promised 
him for the furtherance of his plan. Unfortunately 
he discovered on his arrival in England that Sir 

[43 1 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

William had given the captain neither letters of 
introduction nor money for him, but had allowed 
the inexperienced youth to depart at random, un- 
disturbed as to his fate. When the letter-bag which 
the captain had received sealed, at Newcastle, was 
opened it contained nothing for Benjamin. 

On a December morning in 1724, Benjamin, now 
nearly nineteen years old, found himself without 
resources in the Old World metropolis, a victim of his 
credulity and of the unscrupulousness of a supposed 
friend, the governor of Pennsylvania! When he con- 
fided his story to a merchant named Denham, who 
had crossed from America with him, he replied 
smiling: 

"How could you expect letters of credit from a 
man who has no credit.^ It has long been second 
nature for the governor to be extremely generous 
with promises in order to make himself popular, but 
he never thinks of keeping them. However, do not 
be discouraged, my young friend! Though you 
have no money, you can rely on your trade, which 
is fruitful soil. You will soon find work in Lon- 
don's great printing houses and at the same time, 
opportunity to perfect yourself in your craft. God 
helps those who help themselves!" 

Benjamin at once found employment at a good 
salary, but in spite of his frugality, he used up 
nearly all that he could make during his stay of 
eighteen months in London; for here again, one of 
his Philadelphia friends named Ralph, who was 

[44] 



TRAVELS 



out of work, lived upon Franklin's generosity, with- 
out ever repaying him. One characteristic story of 
Benjamin's life in London has special significance. 
He writes: 

"At my first admission into Watts' printing house 
I took to working the press, imagining I felt a want 
of the bodily exercise I had been used to in America, 
where presswork is mix'd with composing. I drank 
only water; the other workmen, nearly fifty in num- 
ber, were great guzzlers of beer. On occasion, I 
carried up and downstairs a large form of types in 
each hand, when others carried but one in both 
hands. They wondered to see, from this and several 
other instances, that the * Water-American,' as they 
called me, was stronger than themselves, who drank 
strong beer! We had an ale-house boy, who at- 
tended always in the house to supply the workmen. 
My companion at the press drank every day a pint 
before breakfast, a pint at breakfast with his bread 
and cheese, a pint between breakfast and dinner, a 
pint at dinner, a pint in the afternoon about six 
o'clock, and another when he had done his day's 
work. I thought it a detestable custom; but it was 
necessary, he suppos'd, to drink strong beer, that he 
might be strong to labor. I endeavored to convince 
him that the bodily strength afforded by beer could 
only be in proportion to the grain or flour of the 
barley dissolved in the water of which it was made; 
that there was more flour in a pennyworth of bread; 
and therefore, if he would eat that with a pint of 

[45] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

water, it would give him more strength than a quart 
of beer. He drank on, however, and had four or 
five shilUngs to pay out of his wages every Saturday 
night for that muddling liquor; an expense I was 
free from. And thus these poor devils keep them- 
selves always under. 

"Watts, after some weeks, desiring to have me in 
the composing room, I left the pressmen. I then 
proposed some reasonable alterations in their chapel- 
laws, and carried them against all opposition. From 
my example a great part of them left their muddling 
breakfast of beer and bread and cheese, finding 
they could with me be supplied from a neighboring 
house with a large porringer of hot water-gruel, 
sprinkled with pepper, crumb'd with bread, and a 
bit of butter in it, for the price of a pint of beer.^ 
This was a more comfortable as well as cheaper 
breakfast, and kept their heads clearer. Those who 
continued sotting with beer all day were often in 
debt at the ale-house, and used to make interest 
with me to get beer; their ^ light,' as they phrased it, 
^ being out.' I watched the pay-table on Saturday 
night, and collected what I stood engaged for them, 
having to pay sometimes near thirty shillings a 
week on their accounts." 

After a residence of a year and a half in London, 
Benjamin determined to travel through Europe, 

* Benjamin Franklin lived on a vegetable diet for a long time while 
an apprentice in Boston; later he ate meat, but from time to time would 
return to a vegetarian diet. 

[46] 



TRAVELS 



with an English friend, but was dissuaded by Mr. 
Denham, whom he visited from time to time and 
who invited him to return with him to Philadelphia 
instead, where he was intending to open a large 
store. Benjamin was to keep the books, copy let- 
ters, take charge of the store and, as his assistant, to 
make himself familiar with the duties of a jnerchant. 
As he promised him a pleasant position with good 
remuneration, Benjamin accepted the proposition 
and left for America on the twenty-third of July, 
1726, in his company. 

What a pleasant relationship this proved to be! 
Denham treated him like a son; they lodged together, 
ate together, and the noble-minded man never lost 
patience in initiating him into all the branches of 
the new business. But promising as this beginning 
was and bright as the future looked, disaster was 
soon to follow. In February of the following year 
Mr. Denham and his assistant both fell desperately 
ill. The former died and the latter did not recover 
for a long time. The business was sold and after 
his recovery Benjamin was once more alone in the 
world and without resources. Keimer, his former 
employer, came to the rescue, offering him the man- 
agement of his printing office with a considerable 
salary. He accepted, though with some reluctance, 
and worked with a will, overseeing and directing the 
other workmen who knew little of the business, sup- 
plementing the insufficient stock of type, making 
printer's ink, engraving all kinds of ornaments, 

[47] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

attending to the paper business which was con- 
nected with the printing-office, and becoming, in 
short, the soul of the business. As time went on 
Keimer grew moody and his bearing, which had been 
friendly and agreeable at first, became morose and 
discourteous on many occasions, so that Benjamin 
began to think of changing his situation, and made 
use of the first occasion which offered. 

Before continuing, it should be mentioned that 
soon after his return from England Franklin gathered 
together most of his cultured acquaintances and 
friends into a club called the "Junta," which had 
as its object the intellectual improvement of its 
members. Every Friday was club night, and all 
those present were obliged one after another to pro- 
duce a query on any point of morals, politics, or 
natural philosophy, which was then discussed by 
the company. Each member pledged himself to 
read an original contribution on any subject he 
chose once every three months. Obstinate tenacity 
of opinions, direct contradiction, and delight in argu- 
ment were forbidden at the meetings, and in the 
friendly interchange of ideas, the sincere spirit of 
inquiry after truth alone was emphasized. Frank- 
lin corresponded with his family, and here is a letter 
to his younger sister which has come down to us 
from that period: 



[48] 



TRAVELS 



Benjamin to his Sister Jenny 

Philadelphia, January 6, 1727. 

Dear Sister, — I am highly pleased with the account 
Captain Freeman gives me of you. I always judged by 
your behavior when a child, that you would make a good, 
agreeable woman, and you know you were ever my pecu- 
liar favorite. I have been thinking what would be a 
suitable present for me to make, and for you to receive, 
as I hear you are grown a celebrated beauty. I had 
almost determined on a tea-table; but when I considered, 
that the character of a good housewife was far preferable 
to that of being only a pretty gentlewoman, I concluded 
to send you a spinning-wheel, which I hope you will 
accept as a small token of my sincere love and affection. 

Sister, farewell, and remember that modesty, as it 
makes the most homely virgin amiable and charming, so 
the want of it infallibly renders the most perfect beauty 
disagreeable and odious. But, when that brightest of 
female virtues shines among other perfections of body 
and mind in the same person, it makes the woman more 
lovely than an angel. Excuse this freedom, and use the 
same with me. 

I am, dear Jenny, your loving brother, 

B. Franklin, 



[49] . 



Chapter V 
Franklin in his Home 



WHEN Benjamin Franklin entered his twenty- 
fourth year he felt that the time had come 
for founding a business of his own. One 
of his associates at Keimer's shop, named Meredith, 
who had, indeed, had a better training for farming 
than for the handling of presses and type, wished 
to go into partnership with him, and declared him- 
self ready, with the help of his father, to furnish the 
necessary capital for the setting up of a printing 
shop. Franklin agreed, drew up a contract, ordered 
presses and type from London, keeping the matter 
secret until the printing outfit arrived from England, 
when he settled his account with Keimer and moved 
into a rented house in the neighborhood of the 
market-place, where the printing shop of "Franklin 
and Meredith" was opened. 

Having become convinced that "Truth, honesty, 
and sincerity in intercourse with one's fellow-men 
are of the utmost importance for success," he firmly 
made up his mind to practise them throughout his 
life. This contributed not a little to the establish- 
ment of a good reputation for the firm and brought 
them many customers. The second corner-stone of 

[so] 



FRANKLIN IN HIS HOME 

his success was the tireless industry with which he 
worked at his business. 

"I composed a sheet a day and Meredith worked 
it off at press," he says. "It was often eleven at 
night, and sometimes later, before I had finished 
my distribution for the next day's work, but so 
determined I was to continue doing a sheet a day 
of the folio, that one night, when, having impos'd 
my forms, I thought my day's work over, one of 
them by accident was broken, and two pages reduced 
to pi, I immediately distributed and compos'd it 
over again before I went to bed; and this industry, 
visible to our neighbors, began to give us character 
and credit." 

Dr. Baird expressed himself at the Merchant's Club 
as follows: "The industry of that Franklin is su- 
perior to anything I ever saw of the kind; I see him 
still at work when I go home from club, and he is 
at work again before his neighbors are out of bed. " 
The friends which he had made at the "Junta" 
also took occasion to recommend their club-fellow 
everywhere as a reliable, capable printer, and, when- 
ever possible, to turn over to him any orders which 
were in his line. It is true they often urged him 
to separate from his partner, who was addicted to 
drink, and besides was not capable of typesetting 
and scarcely of printing respectably. Indeed two 
of his more intimate friends, who were very well off, 
offered to assume the whole of his indebtedness, 
about $1200, if he would take this step. He waited, 

[51] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

however, until Meredith voluntarily retired and then 
took over the business on his own account and at 
his own risk, with the help of the above mentioned 
friends. This took place in July, 1730. 

As the current orders did not take up his whole 
time, he conceived the idea of issuing a weekly under 
the name of the Philadelphia Gazette, and of try- 
ing the experiment of instructing the people in all 
sorts of popular articles, which should improve their 
minds and contribute to the elevation of social ideals 
in the country. In an incautious moment he men- 
tioned his intention in the presence of a former 
co-worker, who betrayed the secret to Keimer. In 
order to bring Franklin's plan to naught, Keimer 
immediately made the announcement of a new pub- 
lication by himself, which actually appeared with 
the high-sounding title of The Universal Instructor 
in all the Arts and Sciences, and the Philadelphia 
Gazette. 

Provoked that his newspaper venture had been 
frustrated, Franklin now wrote a series of humorous 
articles in The Mercury published by Bradford, 
under the title of "The Busybody," which were kept 
up by one of his friends and led to a pen war with 
Keimer. In the first article by Franklin it was not 
difficult to recognize the "Dogood Letters" in mas- 
culine guise. The style was subtle and effective, 
concise and easily understood. He kept at it until 
his object was attained — namely, the discomfiture 
of the double-faced Keimer. Franklin at this early 

[52] 



FRANKLIN IN HIS HOME 

age already understood the art of seizing upon the 
right moment for the attainment of his object — an 
art which remains a secret to most people all their 
lives. He knew very well that Keimer would never 
be able to carry out his undertaking, but had no 
idea that he should become the lawful owner of the 
Keimer paper soon after the appearance of the thirty- 
ninth number of the Universal Instructor. He 
changed its name to the Pennsylvania Gazette and 
began to issue it bi-weekly. He realized that, in 
order to get readers, he must devote the greatest 
possible attention to the advertising department 
and that in order to keep the advertisements, he 
must increase his circulation in the rural districts. 
He was also anxious to find able contributors, that 
the contents might be varied. But so long as they 
were wanting he carried on a lively correspondence 
with himself, putting a question of general interest 
one day and answering it in the next number. 

The paper contained articles on domestic and 
political affairs, and morals, besides entertaining 
pieces, and the author wove a peculiar charm into 
them, imparting at the same time a sane and healthy 
tone to public opinion and discouraging all feverish 
excitement or restless imaginings. These articles 
were often written in the form of dialogues, and 
usually appeared when storms had delayed the 
arrival of ships and newspapers from England or 
when the rigors of winter had put a stop to all 
travel. If he happened to be at a loss for a subject, 

[S3] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

he would discuss the contents of some well-known 
book, or criticise a poor one. 

Franklin was a born preacher of morals. His 
writings on good morals, on virtue and good be- 
havior, were often inimitable in their way, for his 
talents lay in that direction. When, however, he 
left this ground he was often at a loss. His com- 
ments on the usefulness of mathematics, on forms 
of government, his dialogues between Philocles and 
Horace, Socrates and Kritias, etc., were wholly 
uninteresting and are not to be commended. On 
the other hand, his thoughts on the transitoriness 
of life are unsurpassable. Through his newspaper 
he became by degrees a very widely known and in- 
fluential man, whose opinion was the more valuable 
because he used the talents which God had bestowed 
on him in such generous measure, more and more in 
the interests of the public welfare, and endeavored 
with all his powers to inspire his readers with a love 
of all that was noble, true, and good. 

As soon as his business began to prosper and he 
could begin to pay off his debts, he opened a book 
and stationery department in his shop. About this 
time he wrote a pamphlet on "The Nature and 
Necessity of Paper Currency," which ran through 
several editions, and was largely bought by the 
middle and lower classes. Not bearing its author's 
name it was favorably received, and the council 
determined to accede to the demand and com- 
missioned Franklin to print the notes, which proved 

[54] 



FRANKLIN IN HIS HOME 

to be a very profitable business. Hard as he worked, 
he led a very temperate life, dressed simply, and 
avoided public places of amusement; neither hunted 
nor fished, and would sometimes himself wheel the 
supply of paper which he had bought for the busi- 
ness home on a wheelbarrow in order to show that 
he had no desire to rise above his station. Thus he 
established his reputation as an ambitious, reliable, 
punctual man of business. 

About this time he conceived the bold and earnest 
purpose of striving to attain moral perfection. "I 
wished to be able to live without ever committing 
a sin," he wrote. "I would conquer all that either 
natural inclination, custom, or company might lead 
me into. As I knew, or thought I knew, what was 
right and wrong, I did not see why I might not 
always do the one and avoid the other. But I soon 
found I had undertaken a task of more difficulty 
than I had imagined. While I was carefully em- 
ployed in guarding against one fault, I was often 
surprised by another; habit took the advantage 
of inattention; inclination was sometimes too 
strong for reason. I concluded, at length, that the 
mere speculative conviction that it was our interest 
to be completely virtuous, was not sufficient to pre- 
vent our slipping; and that the contrary habits 
must be broken, and good ones acquired and estab- 
lished, before we can have any dependence on a 
steady, uniform rectitude of conduct. For this pur- 
pose I contrived the following method: I included 

[55] , 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

under thirteen names of virtues all that at that time 
occurred to me as necessary or desirable, and annexed 
to each a short precept, which fully expressed the 
extent I gave to its meaning. 

These names of virtues, with their precepts, were: 
"I. Temperance: Eat not to dulness; drink not to 
elevation. II. Silence: Speak not but what may 
benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversa- 
tion. III. Order: Let all your things have their 
places; let each part of your business have its time. 

IV. Resolution: Resolve to perform what you 
ought; perform without fail what you resolve. 

V. Frugality: Make no expense but to do good to 
others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing. VI. In- 
dustry: Lose no time; be always employed in some- 
thing useful; cut off all unnecessary actions. VII. 
Sincerity: Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently 
and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly, 
etc., etc 

"My intention being to acquire the habitude of 
all these virtues, I judg'd it would be well not to 
distract my attention by attempting the whole at 
once, but to fix it on one of them at a time; and, 
when I should be master of that, then to proceed to 
another. Conceiving then, that a daily examina- 
tion would be necessary, I contrived the following 
method : 

"I made a little book, in which I allotted a page 
for each of the virtues. I rul'd each page with red 
ink, so as to have seven columns, one for each day 

[S6] 





F 



'RAN KLIN HIS OWN PORTER 



FRANKLIN IN HIS HOME 

of the week, marking each column with a letter for 
the day. I crossed these columns with thirteen red 
lines, marking the beginning of each line with the 
first letter of one of the virtues, on which line, and 
in its proper column, I might mark, by a little black 
spot, every fault I found upon examination to have 
been committed respecting that virtue upon that 
day. 

"I determined to give a week's strict attention 
to each of the virtues successively. Thus, in the 
first week, my great guard was to avoid even the 
least offence against temperance^ leaving the other 
virtues to their ordinary chance, only marking every 
evening the faults of the day. Proceeding thus to 
the last, I could go thro' a course complete in thirteen 
weeks, and four courses in a year. And like him 
who, having a garden to weed, does not attempt to 
eradicate all the bad herbs at once, which would 
exceed his reach and his strength, but works on one 
of the beds at a time, and, having accomplish'd the 
first, proceeds to a second, so I should have, I hoped, 
the encouraging pleasure of seeing on my pages the 
progress I made in virtue, by clearing successively 
my lines of their spots, till in the end, by a number 
of courses, I should be happy in viewing a clean 
book, after a thirteen weeks' daily examination. 

"I entered upon the execution of this plan for 
self-examination, and continu'd it with occasional 
intermissions for some time. I was surpris'd to 
find myself so much fuller of faults than I had 

,[57] . 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

imagined; but I had the satisfaction of seeing them 
diminish. After a while I went thro' one course 
only in a year, and afterward only one in several 
years, till at length I omitted them entirely, being 
employ'd in voyages and business abroad, with a 
multiplicity of affairs that interfered; but I always 
carried my little book with me. 

"It may be well my posterity should be informed 
that to this little artifice, with the blessing of God, 
their ancestor owed the constant felicity of his life. 

"My scheme of order gave me the most trouble; 
in truth, I found myself incorrigible with respect 
to this virtue. Neither can I boast of much success 
in acquiring real humility, but I had a good deal with 
regard to the appearance of it. In reality, there is, 
perhaps, no one of our natural passions so hard to 
subdue as pride. Disguise it, struggle with it, beat 
it down, stifle it, mortify it as much as one pleases, 
it is still alive, and will every now and then peep out 
and show itself. Even if I could conceive that I 
had completely overcome it, I should probably be 
proud of my humility." 

Whatever we may think of Franklin's plan for 
becoming virtuous, no one can deny that he must 
have had an unusually deep sense of morality to 
discipline himself thus severely. When one learns, 
besides, that he did not try to combat his errors, mis- 
takes, and weaknesses without earnest prayer, criti- 
cism of his system must cease and especially the 
reproach of godlessness. 

[58] 



FRANKLIN IN HIS HOME 

As for the rest, we may perceive from his manful 
fight against sin that a mortal cannot hope of him- 
self to gain the victory unaided; cannot, indeed, 
even attain to the righteousness of the law. But 
Franklin, who was a thorough student of the sacred 
word, who was only happy in the sunshine of God's 
favor, surely knew the way to true perfection. No 
one will regret that his wish to write a book on the 
"Art of Virtue" remained unfulfilled, for he had 
something better to do than to leave a work for 
posterity which would probably have aroused the 
admiration of like-minded readers but would not 
have helped mankind to advance a single step on 
the road to perfection. 

The printer Bradford, of Philadelphia, had until 
now done all the printing for the State of Pennsyl- 
vania. A copy of a circular from the House of 
Representatives to the governor, which had just 
come from his press, having by chance fallen into 
Franklin's hands, he immediately reprinted it in 
much better style, in order to send a sample to each 
representative. They all noticed the neat and ele- 
gant workmanship and Franklin accomplished what 
he had intended by his cunning procedure. From 
this time the State became his patron! He acknowl- 
edged with a thankful heart the blessing which had 
rested upon his work, and though he had no luck 
with his monthly magazine, "The Political Review," 
which he was obliged to discontinue after a year, 
he had, otherwise, nothing to complain of. How- 

[59] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

ever, there was one want which he felt more keenly 
each day. He needed a faithful companion, who 
should share joy and sorrow, sunshine and rain, 
good and bad days with him; help him in the busi- 
ness, preside at his table, and make his home pleas- 
ant and attractive. 

His life had not been entirely without romance 
thus far. Before his departure for London, he had 
promised the daughter of his host, Mr. Read, un- 
changing affection, but over on the Thames he 
made up his mind that it would be better for both 
of them, for the present, to be perfectly free. A 
letter which he sent her in this vein, conveyed the 
idea that he intended to remain in Europe for a long 
time. How glad he would have been, later, to 
recall this cruel decision, how happy to have repaired 
his faithlessness ! On his return Miss Read had 
become the wife of another, not from choice, but 
because her mother had persuaded her to this step. 
But her husband was a drunkard and a brute, and 
later was unmasked as the husband of a wife living 
in England, so that the marriage was illegal; but in 
spite of this, there were all sorts of obstacles in the 
way of another marriage for the unfortunate woman. 
In the meanwhile the old feeling between her and 
Franklin had revived and on September i, 1730, 
they were united for life, a union which neither of 
them ever had cause to regret; for "she proved a 
good and faithful companion, and contributed essen- 
tially to the success of his business. They prospered 

[601 



FRANKLIN IN HIS HOME 

together, and it was their mutual study to render 
each other happy." That this continued through 
Hfe is shown by an otherwise unimportant letter 
written by Franklin twenty-six years later, from 
Gnadenhiitten, where the governor had sent him as 
commander-in-chief of a force sent out against the 
Indians. 

Gnadenhutten, 25 January, 1756. 

My Dear Child, — This day week we arrived here. I 
wrote you the same day and once since. We all continue 
well, thanks be to God. We have been hindered with bad 
weather, yet our fort is in a good, defensible condition, 
and we have every day more convenient living. Two more 
are to be built, one on each side of this, at about fifteen 
miles distance. I hope both will be done In a week or ten 
days, and then I purpose to bend my course homewards. 

We have enjoyed your roastbeef, and this day began 
on the roast veal. All agree that they are both the best 
that ever were of their kind. Your citizens that have 
their dinners hot and hot, know nothing of good eating. 
We find It In much greater perfection when the kitchen 
is four score miles from the dinlngroom. The apples are 
extremely welcome, and do bravely to eat after our salt 
pork; the minced pies are not yet come to hand, but I 
suppose we shall find them among the things expected 
up from Bethlehem on Tuesday. The capIUalre is excel- 
lent, but none of us having taken cold as yet, we have 
only tasted It. 

As to our lodging. It Is on deal featherbeds. In warm 
blankets and much more comfortable than when we 
lodged at our Inn, the first night after we left home; for 
the woman being about to put very damp sheets on the 

[61] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

bed, we desired her to air them first. Half an hour after- 
wards, she told us the bed was ready, and the sheets well 
aired. I got into bed, but jumped out immediately, find- 
ing them as cold as death and partly frozen. She had 
aired them indeed, but it was out upon the hedge. I was 
forced to wrap myself up in my great-coat and woolen 
trowsers. Everything else about the bed was shockingly 
dirty. 

As I hope in a little time to be with you and my family, 
and chat things over, I now only add, that I am, dear 
Debby, your affectionate husband, 

B. Franklin. 

While Franklin's business was growing and ex- 
panding, poor Keimer's began to go backward, crab- 
like, until he was obliged to sell his shop to satisfy 
his creditors, going away to Barbadoes, where he 
died in poor circumstances. 

But even with increased prosperity, Franklin and 
his wife continued to live very modestly. He says: 
"We kept no idle servants, our table was plain and 
simple, our furniture of the cheapest. For instance, 
my breakfast was a long time bread and milk (no 
tea) and I ate it out of a twopenny earthen por- 
ringer, with a pewter spoon. But mark how luxury 
will enter families, and make progress in spite of 
principle. Being called one morning to breakfast, 
I found it in a china bowl, with a spoon of silver. 
They had been bought for me without my knowledge 
by my wife and had cost her the enormous sum of 
three and twenty shillings, for which she had no 

[62] 



FRANKLIN IN HIS HOME 

other excuse or apology to make but that she 
thought her husband deserved a silver spoon and 
china bowl as well as any of his neighbors. This 
was the first appearance of plate and china in our 
house, which afterward, in a course of years, as our 
wealth increased, augmented gradually to several 
hundred pounds' value!" 



[63] 



Chapter VI 
The Popular Author 



THE most fruitful period of Franklin's life 
began in the year 1732, at which time he 
acquired the reputation of being one of 
the most popular and widely read authors in North 
America. He no longer had financial cares, for his 
business debts were all paid, ' the Pennsylvania 
Gazette had a considerable circulation both in the 
city and country, and the shop which he had opened 
near the market-place, next to his printing house, 
was prospering finely. Here he kept foreign books 
of all kinds, the greatest variety of stationery, with 
folios and parchment, Dutch quill-pens, Aleppo ink, 
scented soaps, cheeses from Rhode Island, herbs, 
coffee, fine champagne, pamphlets for Quakers, etc., 
etc. It was no wonder he grew steadily more and 
more prosperous 1 His industrious wife, though 
skilled in housekeeping and occupied in cooking, 
washing, ironing, and spinning, was as frugal and 
ambitious as her husband, and found time outside 
of her household duties to bind pamphlets and fold 
newspapers, to buy rags for the paper factory, be- 
sides keeping an eye on the store, thus proving the 

[64] 



THE POPULAR AUTHOR 

truth of the maxim: "He that would thrive, must 
ask his wife!" 

No one knew better than FrankHn that stagnation 
means retrogression. He allowed himself no vaca- 
tions, but postponed them for the time when six 
feet of earth should give him eternal rest. As soon 
as his business began to pay he studied means for 
constantly increasing its returns. He determined to 
write a calendar, for he knew that those already in 
the market had a larger circulation than any other 
kind of publication. Every household had its cal- 
endar. Dealers who had no money to buy them, 
traded potatoes or other produce; the nailmaker 
traded nails, the grocer, coffee or sugar for them. 
The farmer hung his calendar on the chimney- 
piece and kept his diary on the margin, so that 
the family possessed decades of unbroken family 
chronicles. 

Franklin said to himself that in case he succeeded 
in making his calendar entertaining as well as in- 
structive and useful, he would not only make a 
good profit for himself, but might through it create 
a channel by which some degree of education could 
be spread amongst the lowest classes of the popula- 
tion to whom books and newspapers were unknown. 
The celebrated tale called ''The Whistle," which 
most school readers contain, and which has been 
translated into several foreign languages, shows what 
an unusual talent for writing in an easily understood 
and popular vein he possessed. Here is the story: 

[6s] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

The Whistle 

When I was a child of seven years old my friends on a 
holiday filled my pockets with coppers. I went directly 
to a shop where they sold toys for children, and being 
charmed with the sound of a whistle that I met by the 
way in the hands of another boy, I voluntarily offered and 
gave all my money for one. I then came home and went 
whistling all over the house, much pleased with my 
whistle, but disturbing all the family. My brothers and 
sisters and cousins, understanding the bargain I had 
made, told me I had given four times as much for it as it 
was worth, reminded me what good things I might have 
bought with the rest of the money, and laughed at me so 
much for my folly that I cried with vexation; and the 
reflection gave me more chagrin than the whistle gave me 
pleasure. 

This, however, was afterward of use to me, the impres- 
sion continuing on my mind, so that often, when I was 
tempted to buy some unnecessary thing, I said to myself, 
"Don't give too much for the whistle": and I saved my 
money. As I grew up, went out into the world, and 
observed the actions of men, I thought I met with many, 
very many, who gave too much for the whistle. 

When I saw one too ambitious to court favor, sacrificing 
his time in attendance on levees, his repose, his liberty, 
his virtue, and perhaps his friends to attain it, I have said 
to myself, "This mail gives too much for his whistle." 

When I saw another, fond of popularity, constantly 
employing himself in political bustles, neglecting his own 
affairs and ruining them by that neglect, "He pays, in- 
deed," said I, "too much for his whistle." 

I knew a miser who gave up any kind of a comfort- 

[66] 



I 



THE POPULAR AUTHOR 

able living, all the pleasure of doing good to others, all the 
esteem of his fellow-citizens and the joys of benevolent 
friendship for the sake of accumulating wealth. ^'Poor 
man," said I, "you pay too much for your whistle." 

When I met with a man of pleasure sacrificing every 
laudable improvement of the mind or of his fortune to 
mere corporal sensations, and ruining his health in their 
pursuit, "Mistaken man," said I, "you are providing 
pain for yourself instead of pleasure; you give too much 
for your whistle." 

If I see one fond of appearance, or fine clothes, fine 
houses, fine furniture, fine equipages, all above his for- 
tune, for which he contracts debts and ends his career 
in a prison, "Alas!" say I, "he has paid dear, very 
dear, for his whistle." 

In short, I conceive that great part of the miseries of 
mankind are brought upon them by the false estimates 
they have made of the value of things, and by their giv- 
ing too much for their whistles. 

In composing his calendar, which appeared in the 
year 1732, under the name of "Richard Saunders" ^ 
the first time, and later as "Poor Richard," he filled 
the spaces between memorable dates with maxims 
and short sayings, particularly such as had to do 
with industry and temperance as the guide-posts 
on the path to virtue and prosperity. 

Its enormous sale proved that he had struck the 
right note and had understood the spirit of his 
people better than most of the authors of this most 

» Richard Saunders was the name of an English author. Franklin 
borrowed it, at first, to conceal his identity. 

[67] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

popular form of literature. The sale began at the 
beginning of October and before the end of the 
month the first edition was exhausted. Nearly 
10,000 copies were sold — an unprecedented success 
for those times; but it was repeated each year for 
twenty-five years, that is to say, as long as Franklin 
wrote the Calendar. The following examples will 
show the reader in what a practical manner he 
sought to win his people to a love of what was 
beautiful, noble, and useful in life, as well as to 
cultivate their taste for good literature: 

Franklin's Advice to a Young Tradesman 

As you have desired it of me, I write the following 
hints, which have been of service to me, and may, if 
observed, be so to you: 

Remember that time is money! He that can earn ten 
shillings a day by his labor, and goes abroad, or sits idle 
one half of that day, though he spends but six pence 
during his diversion or idleness, ought not to reckon that 
the only expense; he has really spent or rather thrown 
away, five shillings besides. 

Remember that credit is money! If a man lets his 
money lie in my hands after it is due, he gives me the 
interest or so much as I can make of it during that time. 
This amounts to a considerable sum where a man has 
good and large credit, and makes good use of It. 

Remember that money is of a prolific generating 
nature. Money can beget money. Five shillings turned 
is six; the more there is of it, the more it produces every 
turning, so that the profits rise quicker and quicker. He 

168 1 



THE POPULAR AUTHOR 

that murders a crown, destroys all that it might have 
produced, even scores of pounds. 

Remember that six pounds a year is but a groat a day. 
For this little sum (which may be daily wasted either in 
time or expense, unperceived) a man of credit may, on his 
own security, have the constant possession and use of a 
hundred pounds. So much in stock, briskly turned by 
an industrious man, produces great advantage. 

Remember this saying: *'The good paymaster is lord 
of another man's purse." He that is known to pay 
punctually and exactly to the time he promises, may, at 
any time, and on any occasion, raise all the money his 
friends can spare. This is sometimes of great use. After 
industry and frugality, nothing contributes more to the 
raising a young man in the world than punctuality and 
justice in all his dealings: therefore never keep borrowed 
money an hour beyond the time you promised, lest a dis- 
appointment shut up your friend's purse forever. 

The most trifling actions that affect a man's credit are 
to be regarded. The sound of your hammer at five in the 
morning, or nine at night, heard by a creditor, makes him 
easy six months longer; but if he sees you at a billiard- 
table or hears your voice at a tavern, when you should 
be at work, he sends for his money the next day; demands 
it before he can receive it in a lump. 

Beware of thinking all your own that 3^ou possess, and 
of living accordingly. It is a mistake that many people 
who have credit fall into. To prevent this, keep an exact 
account, for some time, both of your expenses and your 
income. If you take the pains at first, to mention par- 
ticulars, it will have this good effect: you will discover 
how wonderfully small trifling expenses mount up to large 
sums, and will discern what might have been, and may for 

[69] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

the future be saved, without occasioning any great incon- 
venience. 

In short, the way to wealth, if you desire it, is as 
plain as the way to market. It depends chiefly on two 
words, industry and frugality; that is, waste neither time 
nor money, but make the best use of both. Without 
industry and frugality nothing will do, and with them, 
everything. He that gets all he can honestly, and saves 
all he gets (necessary expenses excepted), will certainly 
become rich — if that Being, who governs the world, to 
whom all should look for a blessing on their honest en- 
deavors, doth not in his wise providence otherwise deter- 
mine. 

Plan for Saving One Hundred Thousand Pounds 

As I spent some weeks last winter in visiting my old 
acquaintance in the Jerseys great complaints I heard for 
want of money, and that leave to make more paper bills 
could not be obtained. 

Friends and Countrymen! My advice on this head 
shall cost you nothing, and if you will not be angry with 
me for giving it, I promise you not to be offended if you 
do not take it. 

You spend yearly at least two hundred thousand 
pounds, 'tis said, in European, East Indian, and West 
Indian commodities: supposing one half of this expense 
to be in things ahsohttely necessary, the other half may be 
called superfluities, or, at best, conveniences, which, how- 
ever, you might live without for one little year and not 
suffer exceedingly. Now to save this half, observe these 
few directions: 

I. When you incline to have new clothes, look first 
well over the old ones, and see if you cannot shift with 

[70] 



THE POPULAR AUTHOR 

them another year, either by scouring, mending, or even 
patching, if necessary. Remember a patch on your 
coat, and money in your pocket, is better and more credit- 
able than a writ on your back, and no money to take it 
off. ^ 

2. When you Incline to buy Chinaware, Chinees, India 
silks, or any other of their flimsy, slight manufactures: I 
would not be so hard with you, as to insist on your abso- 
lutely resolving against it; all I advise is, to put it off (as 
you do your repentance) till another year; and this, in 
some respects, may prevent an occasion of repentance. 

3. If you are now a drinker of punch, wine, or tea, 
twice a day, for the ensuing year drink them but once a 
day. If you now drink them but once a day, do it but 
every other day. If you do it now but once a week, 
reduce the practice to once a fortnight. And if you do 
not exceed in quantity as you lessen the times, half your 
expense in these articles will be saved. 

4. When you incline to drink rum, fill the glass half 
with water. Thus at the year's end, there will be an 
hundred thousand pounds more money in your country. 

If paper money in ever so great a quantity could be 
made, no man could get any of it without giving some- 
thing for it. But all he saves in this way, will be his own 
for nothing, and his country actually so much richer. 
Then the merchant's old and doubtful debts may be 
honestly paid off, and trading become surer thereafter, 
if not so extensive. 

Letter to a Young Business Man 

Dear Sir: — I received yours of the 15th instant and 
the memorial it enclosed. The account they give of your 
situation grieves me. I send you herewith a bill for ten 

[71] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

louis d'ors. I do not pretend to give such a sum; I only 
lend It to you. When you shall return to your country 
with a good character, you cannot fall of getting Into some 
business, that will In time enable you to pay all your 
debts. In that case, when you meet with another honest 
man In similar distress, you must pay me by lending this 
sum to him; enjoining him to discharge the debt, by a 
like operation, when he shall be able and shall meet with 
such another opportunity. I hope It may thus go through 
many hands, before It meets with a knave that will stop 
its progress. This Is a trick of mine for doing a deal of 
good with a little money. I am not rich enough to afford 
much In good works, and so am obliged to be cunning and 
make the most of a little. With best wishes for the suc- 
cess of your memorial, and your future prosperity, 
I am, dear sir, your most obedient servant, 

B. Franklin. 

"Poor Richard," his calendar for 1757, began with 
the "address of a wise man to persons attending an 
auction," which was interwoven with many maxims 
meant to appeal to the heart and conscience of its 
readers. Its success was so great that it was re- 
printed in all the North American newspapers, and 
it was circulated in England, in enlarged form, in 
thirty editions. Translations were made into Ger- 
man, Dutch, Italian, Greek, Spanish, Bohemian, 
and two in French, one of which through the influ- 
ence of the French nobility and clergy was distrib- 
uted in the huts of poor laborers and parishioners. 
In it the author advised against spending money 
for unnecessary articles and especially for imported 

[72] 



THE POPULAR AUTHOR 

goods; and the opinion was general that his admoni- 
tion had contributed materially to the prosperity 
of Pennsylvania, which, for a number of years after 
its appearance, was remarkable. The "address" 
follows : 

Courteous Reader: — I have heard that nothing gives 
an author so great pleasure as to find his works respectfully 
quoted by other learned authors. This pleasure I have 
seldom enjoyed. For though I have been, if I may say 
it without vanity, an eminent author of almanacs annu- 
ally now for a full quarter of a century, my brother 
authors in the same way, for what reason I know not, have 
ever been very sparing in their applause, and no other 
author has taken the least notice of me; so that did not 
my writings produce me some solid pudding, the great 
deficiency of praise would have quite discouraged me. 

I concluded at length that the people were the best 
judges of my merit, for they buy my works; and besides, 
in my rambles, where I am not personally known, I have 
frequently heard one or other of my adages repeated, with, 
*<3J Poor Richard says^ at the end of it. This gave me 
some satisfaction, as It showed not only that my instruc- 
tions were regarded, but discovered likewise some respect 
for my authority; and I own that, to encourage the prac- 
tice of remembering and repeating those sentences, I have 
sometimes quoted myself with great gravity. 

Judge, then, how much I must have been gratified by 
an Incident I am going to relate to you. I stopped my 
horse lately where a great number of people were collected 
at a vendue of merchants' goods. The hour of sale not 
being come, they were conversing on the badness of the 
times; and one of the company called to a plain, clean, old 

[73] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

man with white locks, Pray, Father Abraham, what 
think you of the times ? Won't these heavy taxes quite 
ruin the country? How shall we ever be able to pay 
them? What would you advise us to ?" Father Abra- 
ham stood up, and replied: "If you would have my 
advice, I will give it you in short; for 'a word to the 
wise is enough' and 'many words won't fill a bushel,' as 
Poor Richard says." They all joined, desiring him to 
speak his mind, and gathering around him, he proceeded 
as follows: 

"Friends and neighbors, the taxes are indeed very 
heavy, and if those laid on by the government were the 
only ones we had to pay, we might the more easily dis- 
charge them; but we have many others, and much more 
grievous to some of us. We are taxed twice as much by 
our idleness, three times as much by our pride, and four 
times as much by our folly; and from these taxes the 
commissioners cannot ease or deliver us by allowing an 
abatement. However, let us hearken to good advice, and 
something may be done for us. 'God helps them that 
help themselves,' as Poor Richard says in his almanac 

of 1733- 

"It would be thought a hard government that should 
tax its people one-tenth part of their time, to be employed 
in its service, but idleness taxes many of us much more, 
if we reckon all that is spent in absolute sloth or doing of 
nothing, with that which is spent in idle employments or 
amusements that amount to nothing. Sloth, by bring- 
ing on diseases, absolutely shortens life. 'Sloth, like rust, 
consumes faster than labor wears; while the used key 
is always bright,' as Poor Richard says. 'But dost thou 
love life ? then do not squander time, for that 's the stuff 
life is made of,' as Poor Richard says. 

[74] 



THE POPULAR AUTHOR 

"How much more than is necessary do we spend in 
sleep! forgetting that 'the sleeping fox catches no poul- 
try' and that 'there will be sleeping enough in the grave/ 
as Poor Richard says. If time be of all things the most 
precious 'wasting of time must be,' as Poor Richard says, 
'the greatest prodigality'; since, as he elsewhere tells us, 
'lost time is never found again' and what we call 'time 
enough! always proves little enough.' Let us, then, up 
and be doing, and doing to the purpose; so by diligence 
shall we do more with less perplexity. 'Sloth makes all 
things difficult, but industry all things easy,' as Poor 
Richard says; and 'He that riseth late must trot all day 
and shall scarce overtake his business at night; while 
laziness travels so slowly that poverty soon overtakes 
him,' as we read in Poor Richard; who adds, 'Drive thy 
business ! let not that drive thee !' and — 

"'Early to bed and early to rise 

Makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.' 

"So what signifies wishing and hoping for better 
times ^ We may make these times better if we bestir 
ourselves. 'Industry need not wish,' as Poor Richard 
says, and 'He that lives on Hope will die fasting.' 'There 
are no gains without pains'; then help, hands ! for I have 
no lands; or, if I have they are smartly taxed. And as 
Poor Richard likewise observes, 'He that hath a trade 
hath an estate, and he that hath a calling hath an office 
of profit and honor'; but then the trade must be worked 
at and the calling well followed, or neither the estate nor 
the office will enable us to pay our taxes. If we are 
industrious we shall never starve; for, as Poor Richard 
says, 'At the working man's house hunger looks in, but 
dares not enter.' Nor will the bailiff or the constable 

[75] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

enter, for 'Industry pays debts, while despair increases 
them.' What though you have found no treasure, nor 
has any rich relation left you a legacy, 'Diligence is the 
mother of good luck,' as Poor Richard says, and 'God 
gives all things to industry.' 

"'Then plough deep while sluggards sleep. 
And you shall have corn to sell and to keep,' 

says Poor Dick. Work while it Is called to-day, for you 
know not how much you may be hindered to-morrow; 
which makes Poor Richard say, 'One to-day is worth two 
to-morrows'; and further, 'Have you somewhat to do 
to-morrow.'* Do it to-day.' 

" If you were a servant, would you not be ashamed that 
a good master should catch you idle ? Are you, then, 
your own master.^ 'Be ashamed to catch yourself idle,' 
as Poor Dick says. When there is so much to be done 
for yourself, your family, your country, and your gracious 
king, be up by peep of day 1 Let not the sun look down 
and say, 'Inglorious here he lies!' Handle your tools 
without mittens ! Remember that 'the cat in gloves 
catches no mice !' as Poor Richard says. 'Tis true there 
is much to be done, and perhaps you are weak handed; 
but stick to it steadily, and you will see great effects; for 
'Constant dropping wears away stones'; and 'By diligence 
and patience the mouse ate in two the cable"; and 'Little 
strokes fell great oaks,' as Poor Richard says in his alma- 
nac, the year I cannot just now remember. 

"Methinks I hear some of you say, 'Must a man afford 
himself no leisure .^' I will tell thee, my friend, what 
Poor Richard says: * Employ thy time well if thou mean- 
est to gain leisure'; and 'Since thou art not sure of a 
minute, throw not away an hour !' 'Leisure is time for 

[76] 



THE POPULAR AUTHOR 

doing something useful; this leisure the diligent man will 
obtain, but the lazy man never'; so that, as Poor Richard 
says, 'A life of leisure and a life of laziness are two things/ 
Do you imagine that sloth will afford you more comfort 
than labor ? No ! for, as Poor Richard says, 'Trouble 
springs from idleness and grievous toil from needless 
ease.' 'Many, without labor, would live by their wits 
only, but they'll break for want of stock'; whereas Indus- 
try gives comfort, and plenty and respect. 'Fly pleasures 
and they '11 follow you'; 'The diligent spinner has a large 
shift'; and 

"'Now I have a sheep and a cow, 
Everybody bids me good-morrow.' 

"All which is well said by Poor Richard. But with 
our industry we must likewise be steady, settled, and care- 
ful, and oversee our own affairs with our own eyes, and 
not trust too much to others; for, as Poor Richard says: 

"'I never saw an oft-removed tree 
Not yet an oft-removed family 
That throve so well as those that settled be.' 

"And again, 'Three removes are as bad as a fire'; and 
again, 'Keep thy shop and thy shop will keep thee'; and 
again, 'If you would have your business done, go; if not, 
send'; and again: 

"'He that by the plough would thrive, 
Himself must either hold or drive.' 

"And again, 'The eye of the master will do more work 
than both his hands'; and again, 'Want of care does us 
more damage than want of knowledge'; and again, 'Not 
to oversee workmen Is to leave them your purse open.' 

"Trusting too much to others' care is the ruin of many; 

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BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

for, as the almanac says, 'In the affairs of this world men 
are saved, not by faith, but by the want of it'; but a 
man's own care is profitable; for, saith Poor Dick, 'Learn- 
ing is to the studious and riches to the careful'; as well 
as 'power to the bold' and 'heaven to the virtuous.' 
And further, 'If you would have a faithful servant and 
one that you like, serve yourself.' And again, he adviseth 
to circumspection and care, even in the smallest matters; 
because sometimes, 'A little neglect may breed great 
mischief; adding, 'For want of a nail the shoe was lost; 
for want of a shoe the horse was lost; and for want of a 
horse the rider was lost; being overtaken and slain by the 
enemy; all for want of a little care about a horseshoe nail.' 
"So much for industry, my friends, and attention to 
one's own business; but to these we must add frugality 
if we would make our industry more certainly successful. 
'A man may,' if he knows not how to save as he gets, ' keep 
his nose all his life to the grindstone and die not worth a 
groat at last.' 'A fat kitchen makes a lean will,' as Poor 
Richard says; and 

"'Many estates are spent In the getting. 

Since women for tea forsook spinning and knitting, 
And men for punch forsook hewing and splitting.' 

"If you would be wealthy,' says he in another almanac, 
* think of saving as well as of getting. The Indies have 
not made Spain rich, because her outgoes are greater 
than her incomes.' Away then, with your expensive 
follies, and you will not have so much cause to complain 
of hard times, heavy taxes, and chargeable families; for, 
as Poor Dick says: 

" 'Women and wine, game and deceit, 

Make the wealth small and the wants great.' 

[78] 



THE POPULAR AUTHOR 

"And further, 'What maintains one vice would bring 
up two children/ You may think, perhaps, that a little 
tea or a little punch now and then, a diet a little more 
costly, a little finer, and a little more entertainment now 
and then can be no great matter; but remember what 
Poor Richard says, 'Many a little makes a mickle'; and 
further, 'Beware of little expenses; a small leak will sink 
a great ship'; and again: 'Who dainties love shall beggars 
prove'; and moreover, 'Fools make feasts and wise men 
eat them.' 

"Here are you all got together at this vendue of fineries 
and knick-knacks. You call them goods; but If you do 
not take care they will prove evils to some of you. You 
expect they will be sold cheap, and perhaps they may go for 
less than they cost; but if you have no occasion for them 
they must be dear to you. Remember what Poor Richard 
says: 'Buy what thou hast no need of, and ere long thou 
shalt sell thy necessaries.' And again, 'At a great penny- 
worth pause a while.' He means that the cheapness is 
apparent only and not real; or the bargain by straitening 
thee In thy business may do thee more harm than good. 
For in another place he says, 'Many have been ruined by 
buying good pennyworths.' 

"Again, Poor Richard says, "T is foolish to layout 
money In a purchase of repentance'; and yet this folly is 
practised every day at vendues for want of minding the 
almanac. 'Wise men,' as Poor Richard says, 'learn by 
others' harms; fools scarcely by their own'; but Felix 
quern faciunt aliena pericula cautum : ('He is fortunate 
who Is made cautious by the dangers of others.') Many 
a one, for the sake of finery on the back, has gone with a 
hungry belly and half starved their families. 'Silks and 
satins, scarlets and velvets,' as Poor Richard says, 'put 

[79] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

out the kitchen fire.' These are not the necessaries of 
Hfe; they can scarcely be called the conveniences; and 
yet, only because they look pretty, how many want to 
have them! The artificial wants of mankind thus become 
more numerous than the natural; and, as Poor Dick says, 
* For one poor person there are a hundred indigent/ 

"By these and other extravagances the genteel are 
reduced to poverty and forced to borrow of those whom 
they formerly despised, but who, through industry and 
frugality, have maintained their standing; in which case 
it appears plainly, that 'A ploughman on his legs is higher 
than a gentleman on his knees,' as Poor Richard says. 
Perhaps they have had a small estate left them, which 
they knew not the getting of; they think, "T is day and 
will never be night'; that *A little to be spent out of so 
much is not worth minding'; 'A child and a fool,' as Poor 
Richard says, 'imagine twenty shillings and twenty years 
can never be spent'; but, 'Always taking out of the meal- 
tub, and never putting in, soon comes to the bottom.* 
Then, as Poor Dick says, 'When the well's dry they know 
the worth of water.' But this they might have known 
before if they had taken his advice. 'If you would know 
the value of money, go and try to borrow some'; for, 'He 
that goes a-borrowing, goes a-sorrowing,' and indeed, so 
does he that lends to such people, when he goes to get it 
in again. Poor Dick further advises and says: 

" 'Fond pride of dress is, sure, a very curse; 
Ere fancy you consult, consult your purse.' 

"And again, 'Pride is as loud a beggar as want, and a 
great deal more saucy.' When you have bought one fine 
thing you must buy ten more, that your appearance may 
be all of a piece; but Poor Dick says, "T is easier to sup- 

[80] 



THE POPULAR AUTHOR 

press the first desire than to satisfy all that follow it.' 
And 't is as truly folly for the poor to ape the rich as for 
the frog to swell in order to equal the ox. 

"'Great estates may venture more, 

But little boats should keep near shore.' 

"'TIs, however, a folly soon punished; for * Pride that 
dines on vanity sups on contempt,' as Poor Richard says. 
And in another place, 'Pride breakfasted with plenty, 
dined with poverty, and supped with infamy.' And, 
after all, of what use is this pride of appearance, for which 
so much is risked, so much is suffered.^ It cannot pro- 
mote health or ease pain; it makes no increase of merit 
in the person; it creates envy; it hastens misfortune. 

"'What is a butterfly.? At best. 
He's but a caterpillar drest. 
The gaudy fop's his picture just,' 

as Poor Richard says. 

"But what madness must it be to run into debt for 
these superfluities ! We are offered by the terms of this 
vendue six months' credit; and that, perhaps, has induced 
some of us to attend it, because we cannot spare the 
ready money and hope now to be fine without it. But 
ah! think what you do when you run in debt; you give 
to another power over your liberty. If you cannot pay 
at the time, you will be ashamed to see your creditor; 
you will be in fear when you speak to him; you will make 
poor, pitiful, sneaking excuses, and by degrees come to 
lose your veracity and sink into base, downright lying; 
for, as Poor Richard says, 'The second vice is lying, the 
first is running into debt'; and again, to the same pur- 
pose, 'Lying rides upon Debt's back'; whereas a freeborn 

[8i] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

Englishman ought not to be ashamed or afraid to see or 
speak to any man living. But poverty often deprives a 
man of all spirit and virtue. "T is hard for an empty bag 
to stand upright!' as Poor Richard truly says. 

"What would you think of that prince or the govern- 
ment who should issue an edict forbidding you to dress 
like a gentleman or gentlewoman, on pain of imprison- 
ment or servitude? Would you not say that you are 
free, have a right to dress as you please, and that such an 
edict would be a breach of your privileges, and such a 
government tyrannical? And yet you are about to put 
yourself under such tyranny when you run in debt for 
such dress! Your creditor has authority, at his pleasure, 
to deprive you of your liberty by confining you in jail for 
life, or to sell you for a servant, if you should not be able 
to pay him. When you have got your bargain, you may, 
perhaps, think little of payment; but 'Creditors,' Poor 
Richard tells us, 'have better memories than debtors'; 
and in another place says, 'Creditors are a superstitious 
sect, great observers of set days and times.' The day 
comes around before you are aware, and the demand is 
made before you are prepared to satisfy it; or, if you bear 
your debt in mind, the term which at first seemed so long 
will, as it lessens, appear extremely short. Time will 
seem to have added wings to his heels as well as his 
shoulders. 'Those have a short Lent,' saith Poor Richard, 
'who owe money to be paid at Easter.' Then since, as 
he says, the 'borrower is a slave to the lender and the 
debtor to the creditor,' disdain the chain, preserve your 
freedom, and maintain your independency. Be indus- 
trious and free; be frugal and free. At present, perhaps, 
you may think yourself in thriving circumstances, and that 
you can bear a little extravagance without injury; but — 

f82l 



THE POPULAR AUTHOR 

" 'For age and want, save while you may; 
No morning sun lasts a whole day.' 

"As Poor Richard says, 'Gain may be temporary and 
uncertain; but ever while you live expense is constant 
and certain'; and "T is easier to build two chimneys than 
to keep one in fuel,' as Poor Richard says; so, 'Rather 
go to bed supperless than rise in debt.' 

" 'Get what you can, and what you get hold; 

'Tis the stone that will turn all your lead into gold,' 

as Poor Richard says; and when you have got the philos- 
opher's stone, sure, you will no longer complain of bad 
times or the difficulty of paying taxes. 

"This doctrine, my friends, is reason and wisdom; but, 
after all, do not depend too much upon your own industry 
and frugality and prudence, though excellent things, for 
they may all be blasted without the blessing of Heaven; 
and therefore ask that blessing humbly, and be not un- 
charitable to those that at present seem to want it, but 
comfort and help them. Remember, that Job suffered 
and was afterward prosperous. 

"And now, to conclude: 'Experience keeps a dear 
school, but fools will learn in no other, and scarce in that'; 
for it is true, 'We may give advice, but we cannot give 
conduct,' as Poor Richard says. However, remember 
this: 'They that won't be counselled can't be helped,' 
as Poor Richard says; and further, that 'If you will not 
hear reason, she '11 surely rap your knuckles.' " 

Thus the old gentleman ended his harangue. The 
people heard it and approved the doctrine, and imme- 
diately practised the contrary, just as if it had been a 
common sermon. For the vendue opened, and they 
began to buy extravagantly, notwithstanding all his 

[83] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

cautions and their own fear of taxes. I found the good 
man had thoroughly studied my almanacs and digested 
all I had dropped on those topics during the course of 
twenty-five years. The frequent mention he made of me 
must have tried any one else; but my vanity was wonder- 
fully delighted with it, though I was conscious that not 
a tenth part of the wisdom was my own which he ascribed 
to me, but rather the gleanings that I had made of the 
sense of all ages and nations. However, I resolved to be 
the better for the echo of it, and though I had at first 
determined to buy stuff for a new coat, I went away , 
resolved to wear my old one a little longer. Reader, if 
thou wilt do the same, thy profit will be as great as mine. 

I am as ever, thine to serve thee. 

Richard Saunders. 

July 7, 1757. 



[84] 



Chapter VII 
The Citizen and Statesman 



AFTER ten years of very successful business 
activity in Philadelphia, Franklin felt a 
desire to see his relatives in Boston once 
more. His father and mother had died and the 
grateful son, during his stay in his native town, 
caused a marble tablet to be erected on their graves 
with the following inscription: 

Here lie 
Josiah Franklin and Abiah, his wife. 

They lived together with reciprocal affection for fifty- 
nine years; and without private fortune, without lucra- 
tive employment, by assiduous labor, and honest industry, 
decently supported a numerous family, and educated with 
success thirteen children and seven grandchildren. 

Let this example, reader, encourage thee diligently to 
discharge the duties of thy calling, and to rely on the 
support of Divine Providence. 

He was pious and prudent; she discreet and virtuous. 
Their youngest son, from a sentiment of filial duty, con- 
secrates this stone to their memory. 

As Franklin's elder brother had moved his print- 
ing house to Newport, Benjamin stopped there on 

[85] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

his return trip. Former misunderstandings were 
forgotten and the brothers had a very cordial meet- 
ing. James, being in a precarious state of health 
and looking forward to his end before long, begged 
Benjamin, after his death, to take his ten-year-old 
boy and make a printer of him. Benjamin now 
requited the wrongs he had suffered in his youth; 
and it was the revenge of a noble and generous 
heart 1 He immediately took his nephew back with 
him to Philadelphia, sent him to school there for 
several years, and then taught him his trade. In 
the meanwhile, the boy's mother managed the busi- 
ness in Newport, until her son, now expert at the 
presses and type font, came to her assistance. As 
a present from his uncle he brought new fonts to 
replace the old worn-out ones. 

After this Franklin often repeated his visits to 
his relatives in Boston and corresponded regularly 
with them, especially with his favorite sister Jenny, 
now Mrs. Mecom, and proved himself a loving and 
devoted brother. The following letters to her will 
show the reader his method of education and his 
sympathetic heart. Benny, of whom he speaks, 
is his sister's son, and Mr. Parker, Benny's school- 
master. 

Dear Sister: — I received your letter, with one for 
Benny and one for Mr. Parker, and also two of Benny's 
letters of complaint, which, as you observe, do not amount 
to much. I should have had a very bad opinion of him 
if he had written to you those accusations of his master 

F861 



CITIZEN AND STATESMAN 

which you mention, because from long acquaintance with 
his master, who lived some years in my house, I know him 
to be a sober, pious, and conscientious man, so that New- 
port, to whom you seem to have given too much credit, 
must have wronged Mr. Parker very much in his accounts, 
and have wronged Benny too, if he says Benny told him 
such things, for I am confident he never did. 

As to the bad attendance afforded him in the smallpox, 
I believe if the negro woman did not do her duty, her 
master or mistress would, if they had known it, have had 
that matter mended. But Mrs. Parker was herself. If I 
am not mistaken, sick at that time, and her child also. 
And though he gives the woman a bad character in general, 
all he charges her with in particular Is, that she never 
brought him what he called for directly, and sometimes 
not at all. He had the distemper favorably, and yet I 
suppose was bad enough to be, like other sick people, 
a little impatient and perhaps might think a short time 
long and sometimes call for things not proper for one 
in his condition. 

As to clothes, I am frequently at New York, and I 
never saw him unprovided with what was good, decent, 
and sufficient. I was there no longer ago than March 
last, and he was then well clothed and made no complaint 
to me of any kind. I heard both his master and mistress 
call upon him on Sunday morning to get ready to go to 
meeting and tell him of his frequently delaying and 
shuffling till it was too late, and he made not the least 
objection about clothes. I did not think it anything 
extraordinary that he should be sometimes willing to 
evade going to meeting, for I believe It Is the case with all 
boys, or almost all. I have brought up four or five myself 
and have frequently observed that if their shoes were bad 

[87] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

they would say nothing of a new pair till Sunday morn- 
ing, just as the bell rung, when, if you asked them why 
they did not get ready, the answer was prepared, "I have 
no shoes," and so of other things, hats and the like; or, 
if they knew of anything that wanted mending, it was a 
secret till Sunday morning, and sometimes I believe they 
would rather tear a little than be without the excuse. 

As to going on petty errands, no boys love it, but all 
must do it. As soon as they become fit for better busi- 
ness they naturally get rid of that, for the master's in- 
terest comes in to their relief. I make no doubt but Mr. 
Parker will take another apprentice as soon as he can 
meet with a likely one. In the meantime I should be 
glad if Benny would exercise a little patience. There is a 
negro woman that does a great many of those errands. 

I do not think his going on board the privateer from 
any difference between him and his master, or any ill- 
usuage he had received. When boys see prizes brought 
in and quantities of money shared between the men, and 
their gay living, it fills their heads with notions that half 
distract them, and put them quite out of conceit with 
trades and the dull ways of getting money by working. 
This, I suppose, was Ben's case, the Catherine being just 
before arrived with three rich prizes, and that the glory 
of having taken a privateer of the enemy, for which 
officers and men were highly extolled, treated, presented, 
etc., worked strongly upon his imagination, you will see, 
by his answer to my letter, is not unlikely. I send it to 
you enclosed. I wrote him largely on the occasion; and 
though he might possibly, to excuse that slip to others, 
complain of his place, you may see he says not a syllable 
of any such thing to me. My only son, before I permitted 
him to go to Albany, left my house unknown to us all, 

[88] 



CITIZEN AND STATESMAN 

and got on board a privateer, from whence I fetched him. 
No one imagined it was hard usage at home that made 
him do this. Every one that knows me thinks I am too 
indulgent a parent as well as master. 

I shall tire you, perhaps, with the length of this letter; 
but I am the more particular, in order, if possible, to 
satisfy your mind about your son's situation. His 
master has, by a letter in this post, desired me to write 
to him about his staying out of nights, sometimes all 
night, and refusing to give an account where he spends 
his time, or in what company. This I had not heard of 
before, though I perceive you have. I do not wonder at 
his correcting him for that. If he was my own son I 
should think his master did not do his duty by him if he 
omitted it, for to be sure it is the high road to destruction. 
And I think the correction very light, and not likely to 
be very efTectual, if the strokes left no marks. 

His master says further, as follows: "I think I cannot 
charge my conscience with being much short of my duty 
to him. I shall now desire you, if you have not done it 
already, to invite him to lay his complaints before you, 
that I may know how to remedy them." Thus far the 
words of his letter, which giving me a fair opening to 
inquire into the affair, I shall accordingly do it, and I hope 
settle everything to your satisfactions. In the meantime 
I have laid by your letters both to Mr. Parker and Benny, 
and shall not send them till I hear again from you; because 
I think your appearing to give ear to such groundless 
stories may give oifence and create a greater misunder- 
standing and because I think what you write to Benny 
about getting him discharged may tend to unsettle his 
mind, and therefore improper at this time. 

I have a very good opinion of Benny in the main, and 

[89] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

have hopes of his becoming a worthy man, his faults being 
only such as are commonly incident to boys of his years, 
and he has many good qualities, for which I love him. 
I never knew an apprentice contented with the clothes 
allowed him by his master, let them be what they would. 
Jemmy Franklin, when with me, was always dissatisfied 
and grumbling. When I was last in Boston, his aunt 
bid him go to a shop and please himself, which the gentle- 
man did, and bought a suit of clothes on my account 
dearer by one half than any I ever afforded myself, one 
suit excepted; which I don't mention by way of complaint 
of Jemmy, for he and I are good friends, but only to show 
you the nature of boys. ... 

I am, with love to brother and all yours, and duty to 
mother, to whom I have not time now to write, your 
affectionate brother, 

B. Franklin. 

New York, 19 April, 1757. 
Dear Sister: — I wrote a few lines to you yesterday, 
but omitted to answer yours relating to sister Dowse. 
As having their own way is one of the greatest comforts of 
life to old people, I think their friends should endeavor 
to accommodate them in that, as well as in anything else. 
When they have long lived in a house, it becomes natural 
to them; they are almost as closely connected with it as 
the tortoise with his shell; they die. If you tear them out 
of it; old folks and old trees, if you remove them, it Is 
ten to one that you kill them; so let our good old sister 
be no more importuned on that head. We are growing 
old fast ourselves, and shall expect the same kind of indul- 
gences; if we give them, we shall have a right to receive 
them in our turn. 

[90] 



CITIZEN AND STATESMAN 

And as to her few fine things, I think she is in the right 
not to sell them, and for the reason she gives, that they 
will fetch but little; when that little is spent, they would 
be of no further use to her; but perhaps the expectation 
of possessing them at her death may make that person 
tender and careful of her and helpful to her to the amount 
of ten times their value. If so, they are put to the best 
use they possibly can be. 

I hope you visit sister as often as your affairs will per- 
mit, and afford her what assistance and com.fort you can 
in her present situation. Old age, infirmities, and poverty, 
joined, are afflictions enough. The neglect and slights of 
friends and near relations should never be added. People 
in her circumstances are apt to suspect this sometimes 
without cause; appearances should therefore be attended 
to, in our conduct towards them, as well as realities. I 
write by this post to cousin Williams, to continue his care, 
which I doubt not he will do. 

We expect to sail in about a week, so that I can hardly 
hear from you again on this side the water; but let me 
have a line from you now and then, while I am in London. 
I expect to stay there at least a twelvemonth. My love 
to all, from, dear sister, your affectionate brother, 

B. Franklin. 

Franklin says in his autobiography that he had 
no cause to regret having made his home in Phila- 
delphia, and certainly the city might well congratu- 
late itself on sheltering such a citizen within its walls; 
to no other was it Indebted for so many institutions 
of such general utility. The mere enumeration of 
them will give the reader an idea of the activity 
of his mind, as well as of his untiring energy. He 

[91] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

was the founder of Philadelphia's public library, of 
the Academy, the hospital, the town guard, the fire 
patrol and fire department and it was on his initia- 
tive that the paving and lighting of the streets was 
introduced. It is scarcely necessary to mention that 
in most cases it cost a fight against rusty preju- 
dices in favor of the old order and also against the 
fear of new taxes, as well as the fact that these 
projects were not always successful at first. One 
example will show how Franklin usually went to 
work to propose an innovation to the public and to 
make the proposal popular. 

In the first place he would present a comprehen- 
sively considered and carefully worked out plan 
of the project to his fellow-citizens, together with an 
approximate estimate of its cost. He would set forth 
all its advantages and leave no means untried which 
seemed necessary to bring about the end in view. 
If the business was of great importance, he would 
write a pamphlet, which he would cause to be widely 
circulated, or he would write articles about it in the 
newspaper. 

He writes: "And now I set on foot my first pro- 
ject of a public nature, that for a subscription 
library. I drew up the proposals, got them put into 
form by our great scrivener, Brockden, and by the 
help of my friends in the Junta, procured fifty sub- 
scribers of forty shillings each to begin with, and 
ten shillings a year for fifty years, the term our 
company was to continue. We afterwards obtained 

[92] 



CITIZEN AND STATESMAN 

a charter, the company being increased to one hun- 
dred; this was the mother of all the North Ameri- 
can subscription libraries, now so numerous. On 
this little fund we began. The books were imported; 
the library was opened one day in the week for 
lending to the subscribers on their promissory notes 
to pay double the value if not duly returned. The 
institution soon manifested its utility, was imitated 
by other towns and in other provinces. This library 
afforded me the means of improvement by constant 
study, for which I set apart an hour or two each day, 
and thus repaired in some degree the loss of the 
learned education my father once intended for me." 

In spite of his great activity in public affairs 
Franklin did not neglect his own business for a 
moment; in 1733 he opened a branch printing shop 
in South Carolina, which he placed in charge of one 
of his assistants under an agreement that he was to 
receive one-third of his net profits. As this partner- 
ship was successful, he tried the same experiment 
in several other colonies and accomplished a double 
purpose in this way. Those of his workmen who 
had won his confidence through faithfulness and 
efficiency were thus assisted in becoming independent 
business men, while he himself, by taking a third 
interest, earned a considerable profit, and experi- 
enced the saying that "after getting the first hun- 
dred pounds, it is more easy to get the second, as 
money is of a fruitful nature 1" 

It was but natural that a far-sighted and capable 

I93] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

business man like Franklin, who had given evidence 
in numerous instances of his public spirit, should be 
honored by the confidence of his fellow-citizens. In 
the year 1736 he was elected secretary of the Penn- 
sylvania Assembly, and in 1737 became postmaster 
of the State. The inhabitants of Philadelphia later 
elected him a member of the Assembly, which 
appointed him a member of a commission, sent to 
Carlisle to confer with the Indian chiefs. As he 
proved himself most efficient and conscientious in 
every position to which he was appointed, he suc- 
ceeded gradually to higher and more responsible 
posts, in which, according to the evidence of his 
contemporaries, he always fulfilled all expectations. 

To be sure, it was remarked by disinterested 
people that everywhere where his growing influence 
was felt the best offices were filled with members 
of his own family, a proceeding which was not at 
all commendable. After his election as member of 
the Assembly his son immediately succeeded to the 
office of secretary which he had just vacated. When 
the English ministry placed him at the head of the 
postal service of all the colonies, his son became 
controller, his son-in-law, Richard Bache, first 
assistant, his nephew postmaster in Philadelphia. 
Though this may be considered a flaw in Franklin's 
character, it must also be mentioned that he never 
sought an office, never refused one, but also never 
gave one up. 

In the year 1748 he sold the printing business, the 

[94] 



CITIZEN AND STATESMAN 

Pennsylvania Gazette and the ^'Calendar," so that 
he might have time for studies in the natural 
sciences, and especially for researches in electricity; 
and also in order to be able to devote himself more 
unreservedly to political questions. Although only 
forty-two years of age, the youngest son of the 
Boston soapmaker had been so fortunate thus far 
in his enterprises and so successful in his work that 
he had accumulated means to live comfortably 
henceforth, for himself and his children, and seemed 
to have attained that which had long been his 
dream as the ideal of a happy man, namely: leisure 
for reading and study, for scientific research, and 
for companionship with the eminent people who 
honored him with their friendship. 

At the time when he began to devote special 
attention to certain natural phenomena, among 
them especially thunder and lightning, scientific 
knowledge in the department of electricity was in 
its infancy. No other means of producing elec- 
tricity was known besides friction, and with the 
exception of the commonest attributes of frictional 
electricity, all that knowledge which is now the 
common property of the educated classes remained 
to be observed and discovered; even Galvani's dis- 
covery was made after Franklin's death. Mankind, 
who now, by means of the electric spark, are able 
in a few moments to communicate with their anti- 
podes and can talk across great stretches of country 
and bodies of water; who ride on electric railroads; 

[95] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

who make night as Hght as day with incandescent 
lamps, never dreamed of the changes which the 
telegraph and its marvellous daughter, the telephone, 
which has been so rapidly perfected, would bring 
about in the world's intercourse. It was a stroke 
of genius and a remarkable gift of observation in 
Franklin which led him to prove that lightning is 
nothing more than a gigantic electric spark. 

Franklin's experiments with sparks from Leyden 
jars, the celebrated paper kite, and especially his 
invention of the lightning-rod for the protection of 
houses, are generally known. It cannot be denied 
that the publication of his article about his electrical 
experiments and observations made his name world 
famous. At first, indeed, the contrary seemed to 
be the case, for the Royal Society of Scientific Re- 
search in London, to which it had been first sub- 
mitted for approval, did not know better than to 
ridicule the author, a fate which many an unrecog- 
nized genius has met with. But Franklin's friend, 
Peter CoUinson, astonished at the new observa- 
tions and deductions, was not to be misled by the 
unfavorable judgment of so-called savants, but had 
the manuscript, which he received from Phila- 
delphia, printed. It appeared in May, 175 1, under 
the title: "New experiments and observations on 
electricity, made at Philadelphia in America, and on 
protection against lightning." It found its way 
throughout Europe. A copy of it fell into the hands 
of the well-known French scientist Buffon, who had 

[96] 



CITIZEN AND STATESMAN 

it translated into French by his friend Dubourg, and 
it had a truly marvellous success. Soon translations 
appeared in the German, Latin, and Italian lan- 
guages. Learned societies, among them the Eng- 
lish one which had at the beginning, with scientific 
self-conceit, made fun of the assertions of the 
American, now made him an honorary member. 
Several universities gave to this man, who had 
never attended a higher school but had educated 
himself, the degree of Ph.D. His fame was assured 
on both sides of the ocean. 

In the midst of his earnest studies of the prob- 
lems of physical science Franklin was disturbed by 
equally serious problems in the field of politics, and 
entrusted with tasks, first by his own colony of Penn- 
sylvania, and later by the United Colonies of North 
America, which occupied him down to his old age. 
Though his continual appointments to public offices 
sometimes allowed him glimpses of his favorite sub- 
jects, he was obliged to give up the ideal of his 
youth. 

As postmaster-in-chief of all the colonies he 
introduced a number of radical innovations which 
had seemed indispensable to him when he made the 
tour of inspection after taking the office. He had 
scarcely returned from this trip when very impor- 
tant business called him to Albany, the capital of 
New York State, where delegates from all the 
colonies were conferring on means for putting an 
end to the encroachments of the French into their 

[97] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

territory and the permanent establishment of Brit- 
ish sovereignty there. It had long been Frank- 
lin's idea to unite all the English colonies into a 
confederacy under a common constitution. He now 
brought with him to Albany a plan, perfected in all 
its details, of which the principal features were a 
governor-general and a parliament, to be comprised 
of representatives from all the colonies, which 
should be at the head of the federation and be given 
the necessary authority. Although Franklin's pro- 
posal was excellent in the main and in its particu- 
lars, containing the principles which constituted the 
articles of federation of the union which was later 
erected, it was not approved either by the Assembly 
nor by the English government. Therefore on the 
outbreak of the next war with the French, each 
colony defended itself as best it could. A royal 
army, sent over from the mother-country, under the 
command of General Braddock, landed in Virginia 
and marched to Fredericktown in Maryland, where it 
was obliged to halt for want of means of transporta- 
tion. The general sent his officers into the outlying 
districts of Maryland and Virginia to seek assist- 
ance. He would not, however, have received either 
the necessary wagons or horses without Franklin's 
help. Confident of victory, the English general set 
out with his two regiments and one hundred and fifty 
provender wagons on the road to Fort Duquesne, 
which was held by the French and Indians; but he 
received such a repulse that scarcely one-third of 

[98] 



CITIZEN AND STATESMAN 

his soldiers and hardly an ofRcer lived to return, 
and it was impossible to think of continuing the 
battle. 

In Pennsylvania the State's Assembly hoped to 
fill the exhausted treasury by a tax on spirits (wine, 
rum, liquor), and thus to gain new means for the 
defence of the province; but the governor vigorously 
opposed this unlawful means of helping themselves, 
and this led to continual quarrels between him and 
the Assembly. In order to prevent the recurrence 
of such a situation the Assembly determined to send 
two deputies to England, who should represent the 
province at Court. Franklin was elected one of 
these deputies, accepted the post, and passed the 
next five years in London. 

If we are to understand the ultimate importance 
of this resolution of the Pennsylvanians, we must 
not forget that there was great discontent amongst 
the people, and that the English Parliament, in 
which there was not a single representative of the 
colonies, wanted to im.pose new taxes upon them. 
Besides, Pennsylvania was not so favorably situated 
in its relationship to the mother country as the rest 
of the colonies. An Englishman, William Penn, 
one of the principal Quakers and son of the cele- 
brated Admiral Penn, had received as a gift from the 
government of Charles II the far-reaching stretch 
of territory along the Delaware, with the right, 
under British sovereignty, to order it as he might 
desire, to colonize the land, and to govern the free 

[99] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

inhabitants as he chose. Under Penn's successors 
these rights had been constantly curtailed. In the 
course of several decades complaint after complaint 
had emanated from the people, and as the governor 
only increased the discontent, without knowing how 
to allay it, the Assembly was obliged to resort to 
extreme measures. 

The five years which Franklin spent in London 
( 1 756-1 761) are among the most glorious in English 
history. The time of their great defeats was past, 
and with the entrance of William Pitt into public 
affairs the British armies gained victory after vic- 
tory, both on land and sea, in the East Indies and 
in America. In the latter country the situation 
had grown to be untenable and affairs were coming 
to a crisis. France's rule extended over all of Can- 
ada, including the five Great Lakes in the north and 
the country on both sides of the lower Mississippi, 
called Louisiana, on the south, while all that lay 
between these regions, from the Atlantic Ocean to 
the Allegheny Mountains, belonged to England. 
Now England had long been casting her eyes upon 
the country lying west of the mountain chain, hop- 
ing some time to control it; but the French were 
equally determined to prevent the British from push- 
ing forward across the Alleghenies and, with this 
end in view, took possession of the Ohio valley, 
erecting a long chain of forts as a connecting link 
between Canada and Louisiana. 

In July, 1758, the English took Louisburg, then 
f 100 1 



CITIZEN AND STATESMAN 

Cape Breton, and next the English Admiral Hawke 
destroyed the French fleet, which had come out to 
harass the English coast. Guadaloupe, Ticonderoga, 
and Niagara, one after another, fell into the hands 
of the English army. The fate of Canada was 
decided by the conquest of the capital, Quebec, on 
the St. Lawrence River, and the city of Montreal. 
While the English arms were triumphant in the 
East Indies, also. King George II died, and with the 
accession of his successor, George III, the cry for 
peace was heard throughout Great Britain. Pitt 
was the only one to advocate a continuation of the 
war, because, while the power of France in America 
was laid low for the moment, it was not by any means 
broken. Franklin supported this policy by pub- 
lishing a pamphlet which created a sensation in 
England and America. However, the peace party 
triumphed, France and England became reconciled 
with one another, and so Franklin's usefulness in 
London was at an end. Although he had been very 
quiet and circumspect, he had made his influence 
felt. It had been growing constantly and was not to 
be despised. He had made friends in England with 
whom he delighted to associate — persons whose 
names were famous in the scientific world and who 
wished to persuade him to settle down in their 
neighborhood. But he was like the migrating birds, 
who always return to their native country, for he 
loved his America with all his heart. On his return 
he was anxious to give up politics entirely and to 

[lOl] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

lead the life which had long been his ideal. But 
conditions in the New World did not concern them- 
selves with his tastes, and this time, also, his plans 
were frustrated. 



[102] 



Chapter VIII 
Honors and Responsibilities 



JOY over the Treaty of Paris (Feb. lo, 1763) was 
scarcely dissipated before the news of a fresh 
outbreak among the Indians, now known as the 
Pontiac Conspiracy, alarmed the colonists. Before 
the trees had put forth their first green leaves 
hordes of hostile Indians were skulking from their 
villages to lay waste the outlying settlements and 
destroy the forts. Eight forts fell into their hands 
in quick succession, while the city of Detroit was 
besieged by Chief Pontiac. The settlers had to 
leave all their goods behind them in order to save 
their lives and escape the scalping knives and 
savage cruelty of the Indians. Swarming eastward, 
the Indians attacked Fort Pitt, numbers of them 
ranged the western borders of Pennsylvania, burn- 
ing, pillaging, and murdering everywhere, so that 
thousands of the threatened colonists fled to Carlisle, 
others took refuge in the forests on the Susquehanna, 
leaving all their goods behind them. Consternation 
and terror reigned throughout the whole country, 
especially in Lancaster among the Scotch and Irish. 
Among these lived here and there small groups 
of redskins, who had become Christians under the 

[103] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

influence of the Moravian missionaries and were 
good and harmless people, no longer painting their 
bodies or wearing the feather dress of their savage 
brethren. With Christianity they had adopted 
English manners and customs, English names, cloth- 
ing, and language, and were earning a modest liv- 
ing as broom-makers and basket-weavers. Some of 
them lived at Bethlehem, others at Nazareth, and 
still others under the protection of Conestoga Manor. 
Although they were Christians, in the eyes of the 
Scotch and Irish they were nothing but Indians, 
the Canaanites of the New World! The command 
of Joshua in the Old Testament to cast the heathen 
out of the land was still in force in the opinion of 
many of the colonists, and they considered it a Chris- 
tian duty to cast out the redskins, especially now 
that their race was causing such mischief. The 
movement against them began with threats, inflam- 
matory speeches, distribution of pamphlets, and at 
last there was a summons to a religious crusade. 
The poor Indians at Bethlehem and Nazareth be- 
came alarmed at what was going on around them, 
asked for protection and were first taken to an 
island, then conducted, under military guard, to the 
neighborhood of New York; but their brothers at 
Conestoga Manor were surprised one evening by a 
furious band from Paxton, and six of their number, 
who happened to be at home alone, were pitilessly 
murdered. Full of horror at this heinous crime, the 
magistrate of Lancaster took care of the remainder 
[104] 



RESPONSIBILITIES 



at the workhouse; but even there they were not 
safe, for a hundred wild beasts in human form (from 
Paxton) broke down the doors of the workhouse, 
cut down the fourteen Indians who had taken refuge 
there, and rode away with the declaration that their 
next attack would be on the redskins on the island. 
They not only threatened, but in the month of 
January began to form companies and to prepare 
for the attack. 

In terror of their lives the Indians begged to be 
sent to England, a request which of course could not 
possibly be granted. They were taken therefore to 
Philadelphia under the protection of English soldiers. 
They had scarcely been quartered in the town bar- 
racks before it was rumored that the "Paxton 
Boys" were already on the way and had warned the 
people of Lancaster that they would take the scalp 
of every Moravian Indian within ten days; so that 
the governor sent some troops to Lancaster, and gave 
orders in Philadelphia that any one who should 
approach the barracks with hostile intent should be 
fired upon. Suddenly it was rumored (on Saturday 
evening) that the armed force from Paxton was 
approaching: some said five hundred young men, 
others seven hundred, and still others averred that 
there were even fifteen hundred! At a loss what to 
do, the governor went to Franklin's house, and on 
his advice called the citizens together at the Town 
Hall, where, in spite of wind and weather, three 
thousand assembled and formed a night-watch of 

[105] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

one hundred and fifty men to protect the Indians In 
the barracks. Cannon were brought up from the 
Town Hall and on Sunday carpenters strengthened 
the doors of the barracks and erected barricades 
round about. At eleven o'clock at night and again 
at three o'clock in the morning messengers rode 
through the streets with the news that the enemy 
had arrived. The sentinels gave the alarm, the 
storm bells rang from the steeples, the drums gave the 
call to arms, and, while the women placed candles 
in the windows to light the streets, the men hurried 
to the barracks. Before sunrise nearly six hundred 
armed men had assembled, amongst them, to the 
astonishment of all, many young Quakers. As soon 
as some order had been brought into this army, 
scouts were sent out in all directions and a detach- 
ment sent to the harbor to loose the cables and man 
the boats. Suddenly it had been remembered that 
the ships at the Swedish ford were not moored and 
a number of armed men were delegated to sink 
them. It was too late! The "Paxton Boys" had 
crossed the river and were already in Germantown! 
The nearness of the enemy increased the uncertainty 
as well as the terror. Those who had never seen 
people from the border districts hurried to German- 
town and brought back the news that the "Paxton 
Boys" were handsome fellows in deerskins and 
Indian moccasins, armed with knives and muskets. 
A portion of the Philadelphians wanted to move out, 
surround the army of the enemy and capture them. 
[io6] 



RESPONSIBILITIES 



The counsel of the more conservative prevailed how- 
ever, and a delegation, including Franklin, went out 
on Tuesday morning to meet the disaffected men 
and to treat with them. The arbitrators brought 
back a bill of complaint containing eight articles. 
In the first place they declared it unjust that the 
districts of Lancaster, Bucks, Northampton, Cum- 
berland, and York together, could send but ten dele- 
gates to the Assembly, while Philadelphia, Bucks, 
and Chester sent twenty-six. Besides, they ob- 
jected that anyone accused of killing an Indian was 
not tried and sentenced in the district where the 
crime had been committed, but in Chester or Phila- 
delphia, etc. As soon as the bill of complaint had 
been turned over to the authorities, the "Paxton 
Boys" were conducted to the barracks, where the 
Indians were to examine them and pick out the 
murderers. But one amongst them was recognized, 
and that finally turned out to be an aged Indian 
squaw. Hereupon the "Paxton Boys" returned 
to their homes pacified. 

Even Presbyterian ministers and pastors of 
Episcopal churches, as well as many members of 
the '^Society of Friends," described the crime of the 
"Paxton Boys" as a deed well pleasing in the sight 
of God; and it is only when one considers the sav- 
age cruelty with which the Indians tortured and 
murdered all whites without regard to age or sex, 
and the terror which they inspired, that one can judge 
such perverted public opinion more leniently. How- 

[107] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

ever, Franklin had the courage to call the misdeeds 
of the white men by their right name and to stig- 
matize them. In a pamphlet entitled, "The latest 
massacre of a number of friendly Indians in Lan- 
caster, committed by unknown persons," he en- 
deavored to convince the people of the enormity of 
this crime by describing the history of the first 
massacre, giving the names of the victims, describ- 
ing their harmless character, as well as discussing 
the second attempt, and expressing his great dis- 
gust that hospitality in Lancaster should be thus 
irresponsibly outraged, and declaring it to be incom- 
prehensible that supposedly pious people should 
pronounce such monstrous deeds well-pleasing in the 
sight of God. He ended: "If the Indians had been 
guilty of the crimes imputed to them, they should 
have been punished accordingly by the courts, 
instead of being thus massacred." 

In consequence of all these events two parties 
were formed in the Assembly, and political and re- 
ligious questions became the excuse for all kinds of 
bickerings. On one side were the descendants of 
Penn with their adherents, the so-called "proprie- 
taries" or holders of the land, who sought to vindi- 
cate the crime which had been committed against 
the Indians, by speeches and writing; on the other 
side were the Quakers and the rest of the people, 
with Franklin at their head, who took the part of 
the christianized redmen and complained of the 
governor's misrule and particularly of the new taxes 

[io8] 



RESPONSIBILITIES 



and manner in which the war was conducted. The 
defence of the country in time of war had long been 
a subject of concern to Frankhn and gave him occa- 
sion very often to speak of its defenceless condition 
in the State's Assembly, urging it to pass a militia 
law. But in the Assembly were many Quakers, who 
condemned war and the carrying of weapons. As, 
however, no steps were taken, he determined to try 
an experiment of what could be accomplished by vol- 
untary cooperation among the people. He writes : 

"To promote this I first wrote and published a pamphlet 
entitled, 'Plain Truth,' in which I stated our defenceless 
situation in strong lights, with the necessity of union and 
discipline for our defence, and promised to propose In a 
few days an association to be generally signed for that pur- 
pose. The pamphlet had a sudden and surprising effect. 
I was called upon for the Instrument of association and 
having settled the draft of It with a few friends, I ap- 
pointed a meeting of the citizens. The house was pretty 
full; I harangued them a little on the subject, read the 
paper and explained It, and then distributed the copies 
(over 1200), which were eagerly signed, not the least objec- 
tion being made. Other copies being dispersed in the 
country, the subscribers amounted at length to upward 
of ten thousand. These all furnished themselves as soon 
as they could with arms, formed themselves into com- 
panies and regiments, chose their own officers, and met 
every week to be Instructed In the manual exercise and 
other parts of military discipline. The women, by sub- 
scriptions among themselves, provided silk colors, which 
they presented to the companies, painted with different 
devices and mottoes which I supplied. 

[109] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

"The officers of the companies composing the Phila- 
delphia regiment, being met, chose me for their colonel, 
but conceiving myself unfit, I declined that station and 
recommended Mr. Lawrence, a fine person and man of 
Influence, who was accordingly appointed. I then pro- 
pos'd a lottery to defray the expense of building a battery 
below the town and furnishing It with cannon. It filled 
expeditiously and the battery was soon erected. We 
bought some old cannon from Boston, but these not being 
sufficient, we wrote to England for more, soliciting, at the 
same time, our proprietaries for some assistance, tho' 
without much expectation of obtaining It. 

"Meanwhile Colonel Lawrence, William Allen, Abram 
Taylor, and myself were sent to New York by the asso- 
clators, commissioned to borrow some cannon of Governor 
Clinton. He at first refused us peremptorily; but at 
dinner with his council, where there was great drinking 
of Madeira wine, as the custom of that place then was, he 
softened by degrees and said he would lend us six. After 
a few more bumpers, he advanced to ten, and at length he 
very good-naturedly conceded eighteen. They were fine 
cannon, eighteen pounders, with their carriages, which 
we soon transported and mounted on our battery. 

"While the several companies In the city and country 
were forming and learning their exercise, the governor 
prevall'd with me to take charge of our northwestern 
frontier, which was Infested by the enemy, and provide for 
the defence of the inhabitants by raising troops and build- 
ing a line of forts. I undertook this military business, 
tho' I did not conceive myself well qualified for it, and I 
had but little difficulty in raising men. My son, who had 
in the preceding war been an officer in the army raised 
against Canada, was my aide-de-camp and of great use 

[no] 



RESPONSIBILITIES 



to me. The Indians had burned Gnadenhut, a village 
settled by the Moravians, and massacred the Inhabitants; 
but the place was thought a good situation for one of the 
forts, 

" In order to march thither, I assembled the companies 
at Bethlehem, the chief establishment of those people. 
I was surprised to find it in so good a posture of defence. 
The principal buildings were defended by a stockade. 
They had purchased a quantity of arms and ammunition 
from New York, and had even placed quantities of small 
paving stones between the windows of their high stone 
houses, for their women to throw down upon the heads 
of any Indians that should attempt to force into them. 
The armed brethren, too, kept watch and relieved as 
methodically as In any garrison town. . . . 

"Just before we left Bethlehem, eleven farmers who 
had been driven from their plantations by the Indians, 
came to me requesting a supply of fire-arms, that they 
might go back and fetch off their cattle. I gave them each 
a gun with suitable ammunition. We had not marched 
many miles before it began to rain, and it continued 
raining all day. There were no habitations on the road 
to shelter us, till we arrived near night at the house of a 
German, where, and in his barn, we were all huddled 
together, as wet as water could make us. It was well we 
were not attack'd in our march, for our arms were of the 
most ordinary sort, and our men could not keep their 
gunlocks dry. The Indians are dexterous In contrivances 
for that purpose, which we had not. They met that day 
the eleven poor farmers above-mentioned, and killed ten 
of them. The one who escap'd informed that his and his 
companions' guns would not go off, the priming being wet 
with the rain. 

[Ill] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

"Being returned to Philadelphia, I found the associa- 
tion went on swimmingly, the inhabitants that were not 
Quakers having pretty generally come into it, formed 
themselves into companies and chosen their captains. 
The officers meeting, chose me to be colonel of the regi- 
ment, which I this time accepted. The first time I 
reviewed my regiment they accompanied me to my house, 
and would salute me with some rounds fired before my 
door, which shook down and broke several glasses of my 
electrical apparatus. And my new honor proved not 
much less brittle; for all our commissions were soon after 
broken by a repeal of the law in England." 

The relations between the governor of Pennsyl- 
vania, John Penn, and the Assembly had not been 
cordial for a long time, but they became more 
strained than before in consequence of the Paxton 
outbreak, which had afterward received the approval 
in print and by word of mouth, of the Episcopalians 
and Presbyterians; thus the adherents of Penn, the 
proprietaries or real owners of the land, were brought 
into open conflict with the people's party in the 
Assembly. The latter, being greatly in the majority, 
became weary of constant disputes and quarrels 
with the governor, and determined, on account of 
the high taxes and mismanagement of the war, to 
petition the King to turn Pennsylvania into a royal 
province, thus putting it on the same basis as the 
other colonies. 

During the preparations for the new elections 
to the Assembly, both parties did their utmost to 
gain the majority for the next three years, and the 

[112] 



RESPONSIBILITIES 



proprietaries were successful through their intrigues 
in keeping out Franklin, their principal opponent, 
who had been for fourteen years continuously one 
of the most influential members of the Assembly. 
They lampooned him in the most shameless fashion 
in the comic papers, called him the most unpopular 
man in Pennsylvania, an ambitious politician and a 
disguised enemy of the people, an unprincipled 
fellow and a tyrant. In spite of this the Assembly, 
which numbered many stanch and faithful friends 
of Franklin, elected him a delegate to London, being 
firmly convinced that he was the only Pennsylvanian 
to lay their wishes before the King and worthily 
represent the colony at court. 

When Franklin arrived in London he found the 
three agents of the other colonies seeking to prevent 
the enactment of the Stamp Act, which the English 
Parliament had determined upon, and together with 
the others he did his utmost to persuade the minister 
to reverse the decree, but in vain; for the Stamp 
Act — the command to use stamps (for sale at fixed 
prices) for all legal business — was soon afterward 
passed by the English Parliament, to take effect 
November i, 1765. During the last war against 
Spain and France the English national debt had 
grown to the considerable sum of one hundred and 
eighty-four million pounds sterling, and this fact had 
moved Parliament to cause the colonies in some man- 
ner to assist in raising the sum, or, in other words, 
to make them pay the interest on the national debt. 

[113] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

The unlucky Stamp Act was only one of fifty- 
four new taxes which were suddenly to be imposed 
upon the Americans. In America the news of a new 
tax law raised a storm of protest, and the right of 
Parliament to tax the colonies without their consent 
was disputed on the simple grounds that they were 
not represented in Parliament and that no Briton 
could be compelled to pay taxes without his consent 
or the consent of his representative. These were 
the same people who had always willingly supported 
the royal government and never refused to do their 
duty when it was a question of the necessary means 
for supporting English sovereignty. But they would 
not accept the Stamp Act under any circumstances. 
After the act had become law, Franklin, who had 
thus far manfully opposed it, suddenly ceased his 
opposition, quite in contrast with his countrymen. 
He thought that as it was now impossible to resist 
the law, he might as well make the best of a bad 
business. When Grenville, the colonial minister, 
called upon the American agent to name able per- 
sons among his countrymen who were fitted to 
inaugurate the new tax, Franklin proposed his 
friend, John Hughes, which made bad blood in 
Pennsylvania and put him in a bad light with many 
people. Taking advantage of this circumstance, 
his political enemies aroused the people against him, 
calling him a wolf in sheep's clothing, who appeared 
to defend his country's rights, but at bottom had 
no other ambition than to become royal governor 

[114I 



RESPONSIBILITIES 



of the colony. The credulous multitude took this 
for true, without considering the past record of 
the slandered, and they adopted such a threaten- 
ing attitude toward Mrs. Franklin and her daugh- 
ter, at the time when the Stamp Act was to 
take effect, that for nine days they did not feel 
secure in their own house and called male relatives 
to their assistance. No personal violence was, in- 
deed, offered them; but the proprietaries' party took 
care that Franklin should be discredited in the news- 
papers. One of them printed his picture with Satan 
beside him, whispering in his ear: "I wish you joy, 
Ben! You shall be governor of all my dominions!" 
By reason of the threatening attitude of the 
colonies and the repeated representations of Frank- 
lin to the ministry, the Stamp Act was temporarily 
repealed, but on the other hand the remaining laws 
were all the more strongly enforced. Franklin, 
indeed, endeavored to make Parliament realize that 
conciliatory measures alone would pacify the spirit 
of discontent in the colonies; but his warnings 
remained fruitless and just the opposite means were 
adopted by the English government in London to 
those which would have brought about peace. The 
Stamp Act had made the Americans realize that 
they had long been treated like step-children instead 
of like free descendants of one mother. They were 
the cast-out sons of the maid-servant, and thereupon 
their sorely tried patience became exhausted. Why 
should they not make use of their own raw products, 

[IIS] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

why not carry on a commerce with their own prod- 
uce, why not be allowed to import from any other 
country besides England? Why should they be for- 
bidden to continue appointing the officers of the 
militia themselves, as they had always chosen them, 
from the troops? How could a free people allow 
themselves any longer to be forbidden to import 
tobacco from Virginia, to manufacture iron and steel 
goods, to set up looms, to send woollen goods from 
one colony to another, to fish in Newfoundland, and 
to export rice, grain, tobacco, and other products 
of the country to Holland, without the intervention 
of an English merchant? The burden which they 
had thus far patiently borne, suddenly oppressed 
them like a galling yoke that they wished to shake 
off. 

Franklin worked in a quiet manner, but with the 
end in view of removing the daily increasing dif- 
ferences on either side of the water; trying to make 
the English understand the numerous grounds for 
grievance of his countrymen, while he advised the 
Americans, on the other hand, to buy nothing more 
from the mother country, but to manufacture every- 
thing themselves, even the most insignificant little 
articles. His enemies in America stirred up the fire 
of hatred against him more and more, averring that 
he lived in London, as though he did not know 
Pennsylvania at all. The English newspapers ap- 
peared to corroborate this view, for in 1765 they 
showed an astonishing ignorance of American con- 

fii61 



RESPONSIBILITIES 



ditions, and Franklin had never taken the trouble 
to correct any of the preposterous errors which had 
appeared in them. In the English papers one read 
that the colonies were about to erect their own fac- 
tories and to carry on industry and commerce 
themselves to the injury of the mother country; 
the next day, that the Americans had not the neces- 
sary products for their own consumption. To-day 
the American sheep would be described as the finest 
in the world, and to-morrow it would be said that 
the colonies possessed very few sheep and these, 
besides, with coarse and undesirable wool. It was 
not until several dozen such articles had appeared 
and a friend of the New World had challenged their 
authors to prove their assertions about the colonies, 
that both the friend and the newspaper writers were 
reprimanded by a short and cutting answer, which 
amused the readers for a time. And this came from 
Franklin, who understood in a rare degree how to 
silence an opponent with flashing wit by relentlessly 
exposing his ignorance and limitations. He wrote: 

" ^Manufacturing in the North American colonies Is 
not only improbable but Impossible; for their sheep have 
but little wool, not In the whole sufficient for a pair of 
stockings a year to each Inhabitant. From the universal 
dearness of labor among them, the working of Iron and 
other materials, except in a few coarse Instances, Is 
impracticable to any advantage.' The very tails of the 
American sheep are so laden with wool, that each has a 
little car or wagon on four little wheels, to support and 

[117] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

keep it from trailing on the ground. Would they caulk 
their ships, would they even litter their horses, with wool, 
if it were not both plenty and cheap? And what signifies 
the dearness of labor when an English shilling passes for 
five and twenty? Their engaging three hundred silk- 
throwers here in one week for New York was treated as a 
fable, because, forsooth, they have 'no silk there to 
throw.' Those who make the objection perhaps do not 
know that at the same time, agents from the emperor 
of China were at Boston treating about an exchange of 
raw silk for wool. And yet all this is as certainly true as 
the account, said to be from Quebec, that the inhabitants 
of Canada are making preparations for a cod and whale 
fishery 'this summer in the upper lakes.' Ignorant people 
may object that the upper lakes are fresh and that cod 
and whales are salt-water fish; but let them know, sir, 
that cod, like other fi.sh, when attacked by their enemies, 
fly into any water where they can be safest, that whales, 
when they have a mind to eat cod, pursue them where- 
ever they fly; and that the grand leap of the whale in the 
chase up the falls of Niagara is esteemed, by all who have 
seen it, as one of the finest spectacles in nature." 

This manner of treating earnest subjects is charac- 
teristic of Franklin's best writings. 

While Great Britain continued to embitter her 
sons across the ocean more and more by her various 
decrees, and John Hughes could give his friend 
sojourning in London but very unedifying accounts 
of events in Pennsylvania, the latter felt the need of 
leading his thoughts, for a while, into a different 
channel, out of diplomatic waters into the less stormy 

[ii8l 



RESPONSIBILITIES 



ones of inspiring social intercourse, with its relaxa- 
tions and instructive conversation. He found even 
more than this on a trip to France, in the company 
of his friend. Sir John Pringle. His fame had long 
preceded him, and not only people of high station, 
scientific lights, and other prominent persons, but 
also the King and Queen welcomed him to French 
soil. 

After his delightful sojourn on the banks of the 
Seine, London must have seemed like a desert to 
him; for after the pleasures which he had enjoyed 
in France and the marks of distinction of all kinds 
which he had received, in England he was once more 
enveloped in the discouraging and torpid political 
atmosphere, in which heart and mind are starved, 
and where the picture of the separation of America 
from the mother country loomed upon his vision as 
a necessity of nature. But a pleasant surprise was 
awaiting him on the Thames, although not in the 
slippery paths of the ministry, but in the printing 
house, his first home, where all his writings had been 
collected and published as "Franklin's Works," an 
edition which was immediately followed in Paris 
by a French translation prepared by Dubourg. 

The people of the American colonies answered 
the severer enforcement of the English laws with 
a total discontinuance of all imports from England 
— a heavy blow for English commerce and indus- 
tries — helping themselves and offering all kinds of 
resistance. The people clothed themselves in home- 

[119] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

spun stuffs, went without tea; New York refused 
rations to the English regiments stationed there. 
Boston rose against the authority of a royal customs 
officer to search dwelling houses and sent out a call 
to the colonies for a general uprising. In the streets 
of Boston a bloody encounter took place between 
English troops and some workmen. A ship loaded 
with tea, which had arrived in the harbor under 
the protection of an English man-o'-war, was boarded 
by a party of men disguised as Indians and eighteen 
thousand pounds of tea thrown into the harbor! 
England ordered the closing of the port of Boston, 
the nullification of the constitution of Massachu- 
setts, and other measures which the colonies took 
for a declaration of war. Twelve of the colonies 
called a general congress in Philadelphia, which pre- 
sented addresses and petitions to the King and Par- 
liament, affirming their attachment to the mother 
country, promising their constitutional contributions 
to the expenses of the empire, demanding security, 
liberty, and peace, but decreeing at the same time, 
that while America remained closed to all branches 
of commerce from English ports, all exports of the 
colonies to England should cease also. 

England, meanwhile, instead of meeting her 
colonies half way, became more and more obdurate. 
At this time two long articles appeared in the Eng- 
lish dailies, one entitled, "Rules for reducing a great 
empire to a small one," the other, "An Edict of the 
King of Prussia." The "Rules," numbering twenty, 
[120] 



RESPONSIBILITIES 



which were addressed to the entire ministry which 
had to govern such an extended empire, so difficult 
to manage, designated the behavior of England 
toward the colonies as the surest way to dismember 
a great empire and to despoil it of its finest provinces. 
In the "Edict," it was assumed that the King of 
Prussia had taken the same attitude toward Great 
Britain that King George III of England had taken 
toward America; that all the world knew that the 
island empire of the British was a Prussian colony, 
that the first settlers had come from Germany under 
Hengist and Horsa, and the colony they had founded 
had flourished for centuries under Prussian pro- 
tection. The defence of Great Britain by Prussia 
during the last war with France was an overpower- 
ing proof that England was still under Prussian 
dominion and obliged to conform to its wishes. It 
was also in duty bound, in gratitude for the said aid, 
to help fill the empty treasury of its protector, and 
all the imposts, taxes, and duties, all the restrictions 
of commerce and factory laws which Great Britain 
was imposing on her colonies were but the repetition 
of those to which she, as a vassal of Prussia, had from 
the beginning been obliged to submit. 

Both of these articles had a quite extraordinary 
success. Twenty-four hours after the publication 
of the "Edict'* in the Advertiser not a single copy 
of the paper was to be had in London. The " Rules " 
were reprinted in the "Gentlemen's Magazine" and 
in most of the London newspapers. They were, 

[I2i] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

however, little calculated to increase the confidence 
of the English government and Parliament in Frank- 
lin; on the contrary, it was said that he was not an 
honorable agent who was endeavoring to bring about 
a reconciliation between the two countries, but an 
enemy of England in disguise, who was secretly 
fomenting rebellion among his people. He was in 
danger of being imprisoned, and set sail on the 
twenty-first of March, 1775, in all haste, for 
America. 



[122] 



Chapter IX 

Latter-day Activities and 'Death 

FRANKLIN arrived in Philadelphia on the fifth 
of May, 1775, after an absence of ten years 
and six months, and on leaving the ship, 
which had brought him across the sea in a com- 
paratively short time, he learned to his great aston- 
ishment of the fight at Lexington, a piece of news 
which destroyed his last gleam of hope for a peace- 
able settlement of the diilFerences between North 
America and England. How things had changed 
in Philadelphia! Many of his friends had died, 
everywhere new faces appeared and new blocks of 
houses, for the city had spread out and the pros- 
perity of its inhabitants increased. But nowhere 
did greater changes meet him than in his own home, 
where there was only his daughter, now Mrs. Bache, 
to bid him welcome. Mrs. Deborah Franklin, who 
had built the house soon after her husband's depart- 
ure, was no more! With this faithful companion, 
who had been devoted to him with her whole soul, 
and whose fathomless love had even made it possible 
for her to take his illegitimate son into her house 
and bring him up, he had lost the better part of 
himself. 

[ 123 ] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

Must he not have been thankful under these cir- 
cumstances that his country soon had need of him 
once more? The roaring tide of the Revolution, 
which swept him along immediately on his arrival, 
thrust all these melancholy reflections into the back- 
ground and how to help his country and countrymen 
became the foremost question in his thoughts. 

The mere enumeration of the offices and positions 
which he held from the fifth of May, 1775, until the 
end of October, 1777, and in which he developed a 
really astonishing capacity for work, gives us an 
idea of the load which his shoulders were able to 
carry, as well as of the confidence which his country- 
men reposed in him. 

The day after his arrival he was elected to the 
Congress, to which representatives were being sent 
from all the colonies, and by this Congress restored 
to the office of postmaster-general, which had been 
taken from him. Next he was appointed to a com- 
mission which was to make further proposals to the 
King of England for a reconciliation; to another 
commission whose task was to locate saltpetre 
deposits; to a third, which was to treat with the 
Indians; to a fourth, to treat with Lord North; to 
a fifth, which was to encourage the languishing com- 
merce of the country. When the militia, which 
had been under Washington's command for a year, 
threatened to disband — the soldiers had only enlisted 
for a twelve-month — it fell to Franklin to avert 
the threatened disaster. After this, Congress sent 

[124] 



LATTER-DAY ACTIVITIES 

him to Canada, where a new government was to be 
inaugurated. 

On a November day in 1776 a little lame stranger 
appeared in Philadelphia, who notified Congress 
that he had very important and urgent communica- 
tions to make to it. As no one paid any attention 
to him, he insisted with repeated warnings on being 
heard; on which, at last, three gentlemen, among 
them Franklin, were deputed to give him a hearing. 
In broken English he revealed to them that France 
was prepared to assist them with all the means 
necessary to carry on a war with England, not only 
with arms, powder, and lead, but also with money 
and a fleet. On being questioned as to his name 
and origin, he smilingly raised his right hand, remark- 
ing that he must be cautious if he did not wish to 
lose his head. Immediately after this he went away 
and was seen no more in Philadelphia. 

Not a little influenced by what its three members 
had heard. Congress commissioned various persons 
to put themselves in communication with friends 
in England, Holland, and France, in order to learn 
in this manner the prevailing sentiment in France. 
Many letters were exchanged. Thomas Story was 
sent to London, Silas Deane to France, and a mer- 
chant from Nantes left for his old home with the 
draft of a contract for rifles, powder, etc. A whole 
year went by before an answer from Franklin's 
friend Dubourg brought the definite announcement 
that France was, in fact, prepared to render every 

[125]' 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

assistance. On the strength of this good news Con- 
gress appointed three men from its midst, FrankHn, 
Jefferson, and Deane, to make a treaty with France, 
and as Jefferson declined to accept the mission, 
Arthur Lee, in an unlucky hour, — for he was an 
inveterate opponent of Franklin, — was selected in 
his place. 

It was very natural that Congress should urge a 
speedy settlement of this business, for Franklin's 
last mission to the English general, Howe, after the 
first engagement in which the Americans had been 
defeated, had failed, therefore help from abroad was 
urgently necessary; and although Franklin believed 
that America should help herself, and admonished 
Congress earnestly to test their own strength, his 
opinion was rejected. As a loyal citizen, he yielded 
to the majority, which decided gratefully to accept 
France's offer, and sailed for Europe at the end of 
October. 

The voyage was a stormy one and dangerous on 
account of the numerous British war vessels which 
were cruising in all directions. The Reprisal, with 
Franklin on board, was chased by one of these into 
the mouth of the Loire, on the French coast, in the 
beginning of December, and was obliged to lie at 
anchor there for four days during unfavorable 
winds. After this period of delay Franklin was 
enthusiastically welcomed on his arrival at Nantes 
and induced to remain there eight days. It is 
related that the English ambassador in Paris, Lord 

[126] 



LATTER-DAY ACTIVITIES 

Stormont, on hearing of Franklin's arrival, threat- 
ened to leave France if the American rebel should 
enter the capital. Messengers were immediately 
sent to Nantes to prevent his reaching Paris, but 
they took a different road from the one Franklin 
had chosen and when he suddenly appeared in Paris, 
the French minister, Vergennes, feigning anger and 
exasperation, declared that he could not turn the 
old man out, for this would be contrary to the laws 
of nations and of hospitality. In order not to 
embarrass the French ministry, Franklin soon left 
the world metropolis and made his headquarters in 
the neighboring town of Passy, well content with the 
reception he had met with in Paris, where princes 
and noblemen, statesmen and military heroes, fops 
and society ladies, philosophers and savants, in 
short, representatives of all circles and classes of 
society, had given him such a welcome as had seldom 
been accorded to any one before him. 

The American in a linen coat, with long white 
locks hanging upon his shoulders, was a remarkable 
figure, presenting a sharp contrast to the magnifi- 
cence which reigned on the banks of the Seine, but 
all the more impressive, his unadorned but dignified 
bearing arousing general admiration. It was the inner 
worth of the man, more than his rank or position, 
which had called forth this enthusiastic welcome, and 
those thousands who were accustomed to value men 
for their outward appearance, recognized for once 
what it is that really ennobles man born of the dust. 

[127] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

A malicious joy was at the bottom of the frenzy 
of admiration and testimonials of honor with which 
the Parisians received the enemy of their hated rival 
in rapidly expanding America, for they delighted in 
increasing England's difficulties in every way pos- 
sible. Carried away by the boundless enthusiasm 
which is at times peculiar to the French nation, 
the attentions to Franklin degenerated into silly 
worship. Painters immortalized his features; his 
likeness was worn on rings, bracelets, snuffboxes, 
brooches, and watches, and was displayed in the win- 
dows of every art dealer; his witticisms spread 
quickly all over the country. The populace saw in 
him the actual embodiment of the rights of man. 

Franklin seldom went to Paris, but when he did, 
he was immediately recognized as an American by 
his dress, his hair worn naturally without a wig, his 
spectacles, cane and cap, and if he were on foot, 
a staring throng kept ever at his heels. If he went 
to the theatre, he was always the centre of a court, 
and the multitude broke into a storm of applause 
on his appearance. Hats, overcoats, canes, snuff- 
boxes, spectacles, in short, everything which people 
wore, were a la Franklin! It was considered a great 
distinction to sit at table with the American. Poets 
wrote bad sonnets and ladies of the nobility dreadful 
verses to him. Famous Academicians shouted with 
enthusiasm when they saw him embrace Voltaire. 
There was not a single elegant mansion or palace, 
where his picture or his bust was not to be seen. 

[128] 



LATTER-DAY ACTIVITIES 

It was the fashion to decorate the chimney-piece of 
the reception room with it, to have a Franklin stove in 
some room, or to have a tree of liberty planted by his 
hand in the garden. All this, however, was eclipsed 
by the daily press of Amiens, [which produced proof 
that Franklin's ancestors had been French! 

As Franklin was well known in Paris from his 
previous visit, as he spoke French fluently, having 
devoted much study to it in his youth, and as he 
was greatly aided by the unfriendly relations between 
France and England, his task at first was not very 
difficult. The government aided America in secret 
in many ways. The King offered two million francs 
out of his private purse and a third was advanced 
from another quarter. In order to gain further 
means for conducting the war, Franklin wrote three 
pamphlets: "Comparison of Great Britain and 
North America," "The English National Debt," 
and "Conversation between England, Spain, Hol- 
land, Saxony, and America," and had them printed 
in four languages and distributed in financial circles 
in Europe. These did not, however, accomplish the 
results he had expected. 

While the Revolution was breaking out all over the 
territories of the United States of North America 
and the diplomats were almost accomplishing the 
impossible in keeping France a neutral power, the 
French people were becoming more and more eager 
for the complete independence of the colonies. 
Indeed when the American general, Gates, had not 

[129] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

only conquered the English commander, Bourgoyne, 
at Saratoga, 1777, but taken him prisoner also, the 
rejoicing was universal in Paris and the question 
was on all lips, *'How long will it be before we can 
hasten to the assistance of the oppressed across the 
ocean?" Franklin now demanded of the French 
government a public recognition of the independence 
of his country and, together with the other am- 
bassadors, set every instrument in motion to induce 
the King to enter into the alliance with the United 
States, which actually took place in 1778. Soon 
after this he was appointed by his country minister 
plenipotentiary of the United States with head- 
quarters at Passy, and thus the constant machina- 
tions of his rival, Lee, who had sought to slander 
him in influential circles in America, were ended. 
Although before this important event he had led a 
very agreeable life in Passy and had enjoyed pleasant 
intercourse with many families of his acquaintance, 
he was now more in demand than ever. The friend- 
ship of two ladies, Mme. Brillon and Mme. Hel- 
•vetius, was a source of great pleasure to him, so that 
the old man was once more stimulated to take up 
his pen, and at gay social evening gatherings he 
recited the well-known literary sketches entitled 
^'Trifles," "The Whistle," ''Ephemera," "Dialogue 
between Franklin and the Gout," etc. 

He was remarkably successful in his real task, 
which was to provide his country with all the means 
necessary to carry on a vigorous war with England; 

[130] 



LATTER-DAY ACTIVITIES 

and it was not until he had succeeded in bringing 
the French troops in America into a harmonious 
body under Washington's command, and until the 
latter had defeated and captured the English gen- 
eral-in-chief with his whole army at Yorktown, that 
Franklin requested his government to relieve him 
from his responsible post. 

He now entered his seventy-ninth year. All sorts 
of troubles, which are apt to make themselves felt 
at this age, began to fasten upon him, particularly 
his old enemy the gout; hence the wish to return to 
America became daily more urgent. But instead of 
granting this wish, the government answered his re- 
quest with a fresh task, appointing him member of 
a commission which was to fix the principal terms 
of a treaty of peace between the United States and 
the mother country. To Franklin is due the credit 
of having paved the way to peace with wisdom and 
consideration, as well as having tactfully but firmly 
resisted the desire of the French government for the 
more complete humiliation of Great Britain. 

After publishing the essays, "Remarks concern- 
ing the Savages of North America" and "Informa- 
tion to those who would Remove to America," he 
renewed his request for his discharge, which how- 
ever was not granted until the first articles of the 
treaty of peace were signed, namely, in March, 1785. 
This time Congress acceded to his wishes, though 
very reluctantly, and appointed Thomas Jefferson 
in his place. 

[131] 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

On account of the state of his health, he took 
leave in writing of the French court at Versailles, 
upon which the King sent him his picture set in 
diamonds and the Queen her own sedan chair, in 
which he arrived safely at Havre. The ship in which 
he crossed the ocean for the last time stopped 
at Southampton, where his old friend the Bishop 
of St. Asaph greeted him and where he became 
reconciled with his son William, who had now 
entered the English service. During the seven 
weeks' voyage he wrote various essays, "On Naviga- 
tion, Sails, Ropes, and Ship Building," "On the 
Gulf Stream," "Precautions to be used by those 
who are about to undertake a Sea Voyage," "On the 
Causes and Cure of Smoky Chimneys." Just as he 
was occupied in writing upon coal stoves, he noticed 
the sudden turning of the vessel. She was steering 
for the Market Street wharf and her arrival was 
announced by a cannon shot. It was September 14, 

^785. 

Very soon the bells were ringing in all the steeples 
and the people were streaming to the wharf to greet 
their distinguished fellow-townsman and accompany 
him to his house with loud acclamations. The next 
morning Congress bade him welcome, with the 
assurance that America was proud of him, and that 
the immortal name of Franklin would be gloriously 
and indissolubly connected with the history of the 
United States for all time. The University of 
Pennsylvania, the members of the Constitutional 

[132] 



LATTER-DAY ACTIVITIES 

Assembly, the Philosophical Society of America, the 
militia officers and the town judges all took part in 
the ceremonies of welcome. The people immediately 
elected him a member of the supreme executive 
council and this body appointed him its president. 
The well-earned repose of the evening of life, which 
he had so longed for, was again postponed, his only 
consolation being that a long, long rest was awaiting 
him at the close of his busy life. 

Franklin again plunged into a sea of business, 
still fresh in spirit in spite of his eighty years, and 
with the self-forgetfulness of a man of strong will, 
whose courage is daily renewed by love of his country. 
His final retirement from public affairs did not take 
place until, after long labors, the amended Constitu- 
tion of the United States was framed and accepted 
by the people; and even then he did not cease to 
show a lively interest in the weal and woe of his 
countrymen. 

He had now attained the pinnacle of earthly 
fame and with each incoming ship received letters 
from celebrated Europeans. When travellers came 
over from the Old World they were sure to visit 
Franklin's house before their return. Authors dedi- 
cated their works to him, towns wished to bear his 
name, no paper named him without prefixing a title 
of honor as, "The Honorable Dr. Franklin," "Our 
Celebrated Fellow-citizen and Humanitarian," "The 
Father of American Independence." 

Among all the documents which he received, 

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BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

none pleased him so much as a letter from his 
esteemed friend, General Washington, which ended 
as follows: 

If to be venerated for benevolence, if to be admired for 
talents, if to be esteemed for patriotism, if to be beloved 
for philanthropy, can gratify the human mind, you must 
have the pleasing consolation to know that you have not 
lived in vain. And I flatter myself that it will not be 
ranked among the least grateful occurrences of your life 
to be assured that, so long as I retain my memory, you 
will be recollected with respect, veneration, and affection, 
By your sincere friend, 

George Washington. 

When his old enemy the gout, together with the 
gravel, a very painful disease, confined him to his 
room and at last to his bed, he made a great effort, 
urged by his love for the unfortunates of his country, 
and wrote, for the amelioration of their situation, a 
"Plan for Improving the Condition of the Free 
Blacks," and "A Word of Advice to the People of 
Pennsylvania by the Society for the Abolition of 
Slavery." He also occupied himself in his latter 
days with the founding of asylums for neglected chil- 
dren and for orphans. But the world-renowned Dr. 
Franklin became a greater sufferer from week to 
week, although he bore those long, painful days 
"which we do not like" with heroic resignation and 
without complaints. With increasing pain, how- 
ever, his longing for release and death ripened; but 
he had long to wait, and in the intervals of pain he 

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LATTER-DAY ACTIVITIES 

became himself again, attending to this and that 
duty, at one time making his will, at another 
writing a dissertation entitled, "An Account of the 
Supremest Court of Judicature in Pennsylvania, viz., 
The Court of the Press," a final testimony of the 
noble champion of human rights, which was equally 
fine in style and content, a worthy conclusion to his 
fruitful career. 

His carefully considered will devised a house and 
an income to his favorite sister Jenny, who had 
always been particularly dear to him; to his son 
William Franklin his estate in New Scotland and his 
exceedingly valuable library; while his only daughter, 
Sarah, his faithful, devoted nurse during his illness, 
received the greater part of his fortune; and his 
grandson, William Temple Franklin, a large piece 
of land which had formerly been given him as a 
token of gratitude by the State of Georgia for dis- 
tinguished services. A considerable sum of money 
was left for the foundation of a bank to advance 
money to needy artisans in Boston and Philadelphia. 

Constantly hoping for his recovery, his loving 
daughter sought to disabuse her father's mind of 
thoughts of death, but without success. Franklin 
did not deceive himself when, in the beginning of 
April, 1790, a new enemy attacked him. It was 
the pleurisy, and on the seventeenth of April it was 
followed by an inflammation of the lungs, which 
carried him off suddenly. His end came quickly 
and peacefully, and he fell asleep to awaken in that. 

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BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 

better world, which he had so firmly believed in. 
In a letter to Miss Hubbard dated February 23, 
1756, this passage occurs: 

"But it is the will of God and nature, that these 
mortal bodies be laid aside, when the soul is to enter 
into real life. This is rather an embryo state, a 
preparation for living. A man is not completely 
born until he be dead!" 

When this mighty intellect, this prince among 
the wise, this incorruptible friend of the lowly had 
closed his eyes forever, when his heart had ceased to 
beat, mourning for him was universal all over the 
United States. A countless multitude followed his 
coffin, which was buried in the cemetery of Christ's 
Church in Philadelphia, by the side of his long- 
departed Deborah, according to the personal wish 
of the departed. 

For some time the daily papers appeared with 
black margins, and Congress went into mourning for 
thirty days. But France wept for the departed as 
for one of her most valued subjects. 

A span of eighty-four years and three months 
lies between Franklin's cradle and his grave, and this 
little chronicle of his life cannot be closed more 
appropriately than by the words of the Old Testa- 
ment singer in the tenth verse of the ninetieth 
Psalm: 

"The days of our years are threescore years and 
ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore 
years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow." 

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i^ppentiij 



The following is a statement of the principal 
events in Franklin's life: 

1706 Born at Boston, January 17. 

1723 Removed to Philadelphia. 

1729 Editor of Pennsylvania Gazette. 

1730 Appointed Public Printer. 

173 1 Founded the Philadelphia Library. 

1736 Organized the first Philadelphia fire company. 

1737 Appointed Postmaster of Philadelphia. 

1738 Member of the Provincial Assembly. 

1 741 EstabHshed first American magazine. 

1742 Invented the Franklin open stove. 

1743 Founded the American Philosophical Society. 
1749 Projected University of Pennsylvania. 

1 75 1 Founded the Pennsylvania Hospital. 

1752 First to utilize electricity. 

1753 Deputy Postmaster-General for the Colonies. 

1754 Delegate to Congress at Albany. 

1756 Colonel of Provincial Militia. 

1757 Agent to Great Britain for Pennsylvania, Georgia, 

New Jersey, and Massachusetts. 

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APPENDIX 



1764 Speaker of Pennsylvania Assembly. 

1769 President of American Philosophical Society. 

1775 Delegate to the Continental Congress, Chairman of 

the Committee of Safety, proposed "Articles of 
confederation and perpetual union," Postmaster- 
General of the colonies. 

1776 Signed the Declaration of Independence, President 

of Constitutional Convention of Pennsylvania, 

Commissioner to the Court of France. 
1778 Negotiated treaties of amity and commerce and of 

alliance with France, Minister Plenipotentiary to 

France. 
1783 Signed treaty of amity and commerce with Sweden, 

signed treaty of peace with Great Britain. 
1785 Signed treaty of amity and commerce with Prussia, 

President of Provincial Council. 
1787 Member of Constitutional Convention of the 

United States. 
1790 Died at Philadelphia, April 17. 



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